Fabula Mirabilis
by Choco
Summary: The strange story: Link is a traitor aiding a rebelling Hylian province. Brought to justice, he meets the beautiful and vicious Princess Zelda, who is plotting a rebellion of her own... GanonxZelda, LinkxZelda, AU. ON HIATUS.
1. Prologue: The Princess Can't Kiss Gently

"fabula mirabilis"  
the strange story  
  
**Disclaimer:** Own not.  
  
**A/N:** I've never written a Link/Zelda fic before, but here's one -- with a twist! The title, if you were wondering, is Latin, 'cause I have to be different. **Many parts of this story have been or are being rearranged/rewritten thanks to kind reviewers.** Thanks for helping me make my fic better!  
  
Please be aware that this is AU, contains original characters, and that the canon characters deviate from their given personalities (yep, I'm acknowledging they're OOC). I hope you can stomach it!  
  
If you want to tell me what works and what doesn't, please don't hesitate to give me feedback.  
_

* * *

In her heart she boasts,  
'I sit as queen; I am not a widow,  
and I will never mourn.'  
_-- Revelation 18:7  
  
Prologue: _The Princess Cannot Kiss Gently_  
  
Ganondorf Dragmire tasted like the fear of screaming children, like icy metal, like bitter spices, like the rot of the desert wastes from where he hailed. Zelda often wondered how she tasted. How her cool neck and silver-ringed fingers tasted in the Gerudo ambassador's mouth. Perhaps she would ask him someday.  
  
And, perhaps, someday soon.  
  
Hyrule's regent stared past the colonnade wrapped around the patio on which she sat and onto the massive castle grounds. In spite of the tastefully classical roof above her, a lurid pink awning was stretched above the couch that she had chosen to sit upon. She had been alone -- reading an old, leather-bound book in ancient Hylian with relish -- until a servant told her she had a gentleman caller (and, despite her prominent position in the government of the country, such callers were rare). Now the book lay forgotten on the tiled floor and she was...daydreaming. _That_ was rare, too, for girls like her were forced to grow up quickly, and had no use for such things. Yet it was sunset; pale pinks and vivid lavenders slid stealthily across the green lawn. She could not easily forget what sunset rarely brought...Dragmire. She could not easily forget the emotions that he stirred in her.  
  
It was sunset.  
  
A chill raced down Zelda's spine.  
  
Zelda was the Gerudo ambassador's mistress. There was little ardor in their relationship, more because the princess embraced Hylian cultural beliefs that called for repression in romantic affairs than any unhappiness with the arrangement. Zelda, far from a shy maid, had known from the very first when he wanted her -- when, during his appointment to the High King's small council, he let his lips linger on her velvety downturned hand as he kissed it...and she a girl-child of fourteen. She had never found him particularly attractive -- what with his thick lips, round barbaric ears, large nose, and awful amber eyes (fixing on her with such intensity she thought she might burn). But Zelda was a practical girl, and slid demurely into his bed at fifteen, her shrewd mind noting the benefit to her kingdom if Dragmire were to lose himself in her flesh. But by now, she knew Dragmire had outlived his usefulness.  
  
_The same thing you said on your fifteenth birthday,_ Zelda silently chided herself, disgusted at her inner weakness and broken willpower. Her mind was certain Dragmire would be reduced to Court Nothing upon her ailing father's death -- yet her helplessly addicted body was reluctant to go along with her plans.  
  
As it was now.  
  
Almost as if her thoughts had summoned him, Ambassador Ganondorf Dragmire strolled out onto the shaded patio, unaccompanied -- and approaching with an aching slowness that nearly drove Zelda mad. "_Din_, you came," she said in a broken voice, surging from the couch and rushing toward him. It was strange, she thought, how she lost her mind in his presence.  
  
His lips curved in a small, unreadable smile as she approached him and coiled her arms around his neck. He'd just come from battle, it seemed. His middle was thick with leather and he stank of sweat. Black armor dug deliciously into the princess' chest as she pressed herself close against the much larger man. "Three weeks is really too long to wait," she breathed. Yes, it _had_ been three weeks since they, inhabitants of the same castle, had found a moment alone together, hadn't it?  
  
"Look at you," Dragmire said. He had a methodic way of speaking that often made others think him a lackwit.  
  
"Don't look at me. Kiss me." She hated the plaintive, whining tone of her voice, but there wasn't a thing she could do about it. _Wanted_ to do about it, rather.  
  
"No. I don't have time for things like that. We need to talk, Princess." Something was wrong; she could hear it in his voice. She wondered why she hadn't noticed before.  
  
"Ganondorf...what's wrong?" They were intimate enough to call each other by their first names, but she had learned it was a secret pleasure of his to stick to formalities. But he also stuck to formalities when he was angry. She wondered if he was. And though her voice was tender and her fingers as well as they stroked the tan skin of his jawline, her blue-gray eyes sharpened as they whipped over his face. _Goddesses, he's so handsome angry,_ she found herself thinking just before wondering about her suddenly weak, fragmented thought pattern.  
  
The ambassador, ignoring her doting caresses, held her gruffly at arm's length. Zelda looked up at him with startled, confused eyes. "You're Hyrule's regent. Along with the small council, you have almost a complete monopoly on all political decisions made in this country...and beyond its borders." His voice was suddenly hard, his fingers pressing painfully into Zelda's arms.  
  
"Yes. What of it, Ganondorf? For Nayru's sake, stop it!" She tried to squirm out of his grip in vain.  
  
"Force a vote on the small council to lift the trade embargo on my people. The Gerudo are starving...and if you refuse give us what we require, we'll join the Koholints in their rebellion against Hyrule. _They_ don't lack for food, I assure you." His voice was flat, as though he was commenting on the weather.  
  
Zelda recoiled, eyes going wide as she finally pulled free from Dragmire's grasp; she was suffocating. She had known that a man was more reluctant to kill a woman before he had received what he wanted most from her -- but, apparently, after taking his fill, _she_ had outlived _her_ usefulness. Her surprise turned to hurt...and anger...and amusement! She laughed at him. "Yes, they don't lack for food, but _we_ own it all. You'd do well to remember that. Merely suggesting something like what you have is treason. I could throw you into the dungeons for that, I assure _you_."  
  
Clearly, _that_ hadn't been the response Ganondorf had been expecting. "Wha...what?" he bleated. "You won't even..._consider_ the possibility of drafting a treaty?"  
  
"Drafting a treaty! We've already signed ten treaties with your people since the death of your father, the great Mandrag Ganon! You're a weak ruler, Ganondorf. You spend your time as a _statesman_, here on Papa's small council" -- her voice was trembling, close to breaking -- "and away from your desert wastes and your people. They're women, and women are weak. No wonder they're dying! Do you think, honestly, that either one of our economies would survive another treaty? Do you think we have grain of our own to spare? We have that rebellion in Koholint to crush, you know." Her lips pressed themselves together to keep her from saying anything more. Certainly it wouldn't be wise to admit, especially to a man considering joining the rebels, that the kingdom was in no way 'crushing' the rebellion. Never mind that he obviously knew.  
  
The lines of age on Dragmire's face seemed to harden. His battle-roughened hands rubbed almost absently against her shoulders when he touched her again. "Do you...do you really want to see me and my people on the opposite side of your campaign?" He sounded surprised, but not really hurt, and Zelda found _herself_ hurt, irrationally.  
  
Zelda laughed again and pushed away from Dragmire's warm, gentle touches. "You and your people? What would you and your people do to aid the Koholints? You can't even feed yourselves! Your threat is an empty one. What a pitiful excuse for a man you are."  
  
"Yes, I am, aren't I? Ah, but look who I learned it from -- the most conniving princess I know." Dragmire, predictably, persisted. He pulled the princess against him -- who let out a startled, protesting gasp -- and kissed her powdered cheeks softly. Zelda could feel those cheeks flush with warm blood in slightly embarrassed anger that Dragmire should act like this -- and to talk to the Princess of Hyrule so. But she was slowly melting under the sweet pressure of his continued, feather-light kisses. It wasn't fair that he was so _good_ at this!  
  
Thankfully -- for Zelda, at least -- they were interrupted by one of the castle's lesser servants, a page who let out a sharp gasp when he saw just whose arms the princess was in. Zelda disentangled herself completely from the Gerudo ambassador at that, grateful for the white powder that kept her flush from being visible. _He looks at me as though he thinks me pure and virginal -- as if I'm one of those young girls who must be locked up to be kept safe from the priests of our goddesses, the Three.  
  
Or young boys, as the case may be._  
  
"What is it?" the regent said outloud, raising herself to her full height (which was far from impressive in the presence of the Gerudo) as she retreated to the couch to force her feet into the slippers she'd kicked off hours earlier. She slid her cold, winter-pale hands over her cheeks, as if that could keep them from flushing.  
  
The page, though disillusioned, rallied quickly -- Zelda admired him for that. Then again, he was probably just very proud of the fact that he was getting to deliver such an important message. "Your Grace, if you please -- the High King has requested your presence in the Audience Chamber." The page shot a nasty glance the ambassador's way when he realized he'd have to address him too, but the Gerudo answered with a benign smile. "Your Honor, you must come as well. The -- the consul of the Koholint province has come to speak to you both. He would like to discuss business with you right away!" The page's eyes suddenly widened and he stepped back to flee, as if he didn't want such a couple to ask him any questions.  
  
"Oh, _Din_," Zelda cursed, narrowing her eyes and rubbing her shoulders against the chill of oncoming night. "We weren't expecting the consul for a fortnight, at least." Her light eyes sought out his. "Ganondorf, we have to go -- the consul is a very important man."  
  
They both knew what she was implying -- that Dragmire was not and that they would be constrained to rush off anyway, like it or not. But Dragmire just shrugged.  
  
"Then let's go and talk to your consul."  
  
Zelda came to him again at his calm indifference and flung her arms around his neck -- even though she knew he wouldn't embrace her back. Her mouth was very warm and very wet against his neck, which was the highest she could reach with her mouth when not on tiptoe. "We really _do_ have to go. And I -- I--"  
  
Dragmire pulled her off of him with one of his calmly composed smiles. "Don't say it. You and I both know you aren't capable of dealing with the consequences associated with saying a thing like that. We must needs go to the Audience Chamber. We can find a moment alone before the Gerudo run out of food to...talk."  
  
_Hopefully, we can find a moment alone soon. _There was no thought or care given to the threat of losing his alliance to the Koholints when he hinted at things that would lead to the meeting of their excited sweaty bodies. Zelda stood on tiptoe, no matter what damage she was doing to her slippers, and brushed her gentlest kiss against his cheek, a light grazing of teeth against skin. She pulled away slowly, as though reluctant to go and see the 'important' consul, and made her way even more slowly toward the entrance back into the castle. She knew Dragmire well enough to know he could find his own way to the Audience Chamber. She stopped at the threshold, though, turning back and shooting her lover a critical glance. "We _will_ talk, Ganondorf."  
  
"Of course," Dragmire said to the dark, his eyes slanted and feline in the failing sun.


	2. The Sleepy Kingdom by the Sea

Chapter One: _The Sleepy Kingdom by the Sea_

There was once a kingdom, lying sleepy by the sea. Rich and beautiful, it was left to be. At least, until a race of long-eared, pale-eyed creatures -- who rode dust-blowing monsters transported to the island in their wicked battleships -- swept over the peaceful isle and overwhelmed its pitiful military forces like hail in a storm. Shrines to the local deity were leveled; libraries that held priceless books written in the predawn of man were burned to the ground; and the native inhabitants of this kingdom lying sleepy by the sea were turned into the slaves of the...Hylians.

The Hylian governor and consul, who arrived from the mainland soon after the conquest, beheaded the entire Royal Family and claimed the riches of the kingdom's treasury as their own. They sought to completely demean the natives! As a final, crushing blow -- a decision made out of fear and ignorance -- the new government made the native people learn the Hylian language, and erected massive icons of the Seal of the Golden Power, representative of the Three...some of the _old_ goddesses, who demanded sacrifice. In less than a hundred years -- and completely under the reign of Harkinian I, one thousand years in the past of present-day Hyrule -- the province of Koholint, forty miles off Hyrule's coast, had no more than a whisper of the memory of its glorious past.

Link Medilia listened to those whispers. He gleaned what he could from them of the illustrious history of what had once been the sleepy kingdom by the sea, of the land he lived in now. Even while the thin atmosphere of his mountain home starved him of air and the lack of sufficient food and water made him nearly as emaciated as an ideal Hylian lady, he fed on his hatred of the Hylians and what they had done so long ago, somehow keeping himself strong. It was what helped motivate him to continue repelling Orca's assault. As he did now.

"Left, up. Right, right, up. Down, left, up, left, right. Thrust, left!" Blocking the blows his master called out as he performed them, Link helped create a terrible metallic sound as his own sword clashed with identical steel. Beyond the two men engaged in their swordplay, a dramatic red-yellow sunset lit the cliffs of Death Mountain. Evening would soon be upon Koholint Island -- something the older, potbellied swordsmaster seemed to keep in mind. "Down, right, thrust, left, down, up, thrust. Thrust, up, down, right, right, down, thrust, thrust, left. Left, down, down, up, left, down, thrust, left -- left -- _left!_"

Orca's last slash came from the right instead of the left, throwing Link off, knocking the blunt, forbidden tourney sword from his hand. Seeing his master's sword coming toward him again, the teenager grinned and threw up his hands. "Yield," he groaned, a mischievous glint in his sloe eyes. "I yield, you lying old man. Put down your sword, I trust you not."

Shaking his head in disappointment, Orca stopped mid-swing and let his sword fall to the rocky ground with a clatter. "You yield again? This is one of the simplest of exercises, Link. I thought you'd learned not to listen to words years ago. Your enemies will not allow you the luxury of predictability when you come to murder them with a sword in your fist." The swordsmaster's expression now was deeply troubled, his forehead creasing as he reached up to scratch the top of his bald head.

Flushing, Link turned away, his eyes first on the crude wooden hut that served as their home and then on the rest of Death Mountain. This high up, their heads nearly scraped against the clouds. Last week was the second time during this moon's cycle that they'd had to climb higher into the mountains to escape the Royal Bodyguards' swords -- and even that didn't guarantee safety. Now, however, he'd found something completely new to worry about. "I know," he said after a pause. "It's just...I can't concentrate today."

When Link lapsed into silence, Orca finished for him. "It's been nine years...as of today." His gravelly voice was faint as he, too, remembered. It had been nine years since Orca had come to the boy's native Animal Village, taking him away to apprentice in the ways of the sword. Nine years since Link had known a day free of the song of swords. Nine years since he had seen his unpretentious, hardworking carpenter of a father.

Chin jutting, Link reached down to collect the two blunt swords, not complaining about their weight; despite the shameful failure he'd just experienced, he was conditioned and well-muscled. "Never mind," he muttered as his muscles worked. A swordsmaster was a superior creature to mere men, he had been taught, disconnected from the family ties that shackled others to failure and death. Thinking of the past had lowered him in the eyes of Orca once today; Link resolved never to dwell on such weakness again. "What we _should_ be talking about is why you gave me such an easy challenge today."

"An easy challenge you couldn't surmount? I noticed the look in your eyes, even if you did not. You looked as if you needed that. Besides" -- as if trying to break the somber mood, Orca's tone lightened -- "someone of mingled blood couldn't hope to match a full-blooded Koholint's endurance all the time."

With Orca's offhand comment, Link's mind was brought back, against his will, to his ultimate shame -- the pointy ears, blond hair, and dark blue eyes that marked him more the offspring of a Hylian mother who he had never known (nor cared to know) than his Koholint father. At least, he thought as he put the swords in a crate and looked down at the green tunic that identified him as a Koholint noncitizen, his citizenship had been determined by the citizenship of his father; at least he wasn't completely tainted.

"I suppose not," Link responded, his voice just a trifle cold; Orca was, after all, one of those full-blooded Koholints. With the swords put away, he went to join his swordsmaster where he stood near the edge of a cliff that dropped down a hundred feet into a green valley. Looking around at the clumps of bushes that inadequately hid their home, he asked in a whisper, "When are we going back to Kanalet?"

When Orca gave him a thin-lipped frown, Link knew that the old man was as worried about the answer to that question as he. The two of them were reluctant members of an underground rebellion group of Koholints led by a man named Mutoh. They had joined him only because he promised them eventual freedom from the Hylians, though he'd never done much to make that dream a reality. The trouble was, the base of the "rebellion's" operations was raped and ravaged Kanalet Castle, the ancient seat of the Koholint Royal Family that died so long ago, the ancient seat far away from where Link and Orca were forced to hide. The last time they'd been able to get away, it had taken them a moon's cycle to get back and forth. The old man had cursed Mutoh in his cups for choosing a stronghold that wasn't centralized nearer them, but sober, he acknowledged there was nothing he could do to change it.

Orca picked at a hangnail. "Maybe never. A swordsmaster ties himself down to no one, no _cause_, Link."

"But if we can pull free of the Hylians--"

"I can tell you one thing: it won't happen that way." Orca's voice was uncharacteristically harsh. "Mutoh can barely speak for himself without that damned _lady_ around; he can't even plan raids against the Hylians! Wars are won with _words_ in the end, Link, not swords. Mutoh has mastered neither art. In essence, he's signed his own death warrant."

This was a subject Link felt passionately about. He had never known a day of freedom, of being able to swear his allegiance to a Koholint monarch, of peace with the fact that he'd never be stopped in the street to be accosted and humiliated by the arrogant Hylians. He could identify with Mutoh completely. They, themselves, had signed their own death warrants by having those tourney swords, as well as sharper weapons inside their hut -- especially when their Hylian overlords had gone to such lengths to keep weapons away from the Koholints (the "Disarmament" in the days of Harkinian I resulted in the slaughter of one-sixth of the island's population). Indeed, they were being searched for by the Royal Bodyguards. What, really, did they have to lose? "All the more reason to help him! We'll never be free if we don't--"

But Link never did tell Orca what would free the Koholints. He stopped mid-sentence, his mouth open, at the sound of rough voices speaking fluent Hylian, the scrape of a sword against a scabbard, the rustle of movement in the bushes that hid them from the Hylians and that hid the Hylians from them.

One of Orca's hands shot up and gripped Link's upper arm so tightly he thought it was like to break off. Link knew the action was meant to keep him still, for the safety of them both, but it slightly annoyed them. This had happened to them before, down in the lower levels of Death Mountain; it was the inevitable result of being marked dead men. He knew what to do. Always before, so long as they'd stayed still and quiet, the Hylians had left them alone and moved on. They'd only had to kill one small detachment of Royal Bodyguards sent in search of them.

That night would become the second time, Link knew, the moment he heard the Royal Bodyguards stop moving. "It looks so deserted up here," said one with a youngish voice. "So deserted... I can hardly breathe."

"Well, the noncitizen said they'd be up here," said one who sounded slightly more authoritative. "I trust her. She's served her true government faithfully many and more times. They'll have hidden themselves, I'll wager. _Suck_ the air, Linden, if you're having trouble breathing. You don't hear anyone else complaining, do you?"

Link didn't understand the Bodyguards' rapid Hylian, but apparently Orca did, for his grip on his apprentice's arm tightened. He made Link face him and stared at him, his eyes boring into the half-Koholint like twin brown needles. "Do you remember our creed? The creed that all Koholint swordsmasters have recited since the beginning of time?" Orca asked him in a whisper-voice while the Bodyguards made crude jokes about Linden and sucking.

"I am prepared to die today," Link said, repeating the words Orca had taught him at seven years old.

"Good." Orca released his grip on Link's arm. "They won't allow us the dream of an easy peace this time, I fear. Go into the hut, Link. Go, and prepare to fight and die."

They were the words that preceded every fight that the two of them had ever fought together. _Then why does he sound so scared?_

The Royal Bodyguards were bickering, and while they were preoccupied, Link and Orca turned their backs on them. Climbing onto their tiptoes, they crossed the expanse of land that separated the edge of the cliff from their hut without disturbing the loose gravel beneath their feet; a Koholint swordsmaster mastered stealth early in his training, or died. But in their haste to get inside the hut, neither of them remembered to pick up the crate that contained their tourney swords.

Inside the dusty, reeking hut, that hardly seemed to matter. Orca and Link lowered themselves together, and looked beneath their cots for their weapons. The two swordsmasters rose as one, each clutching their longswords. Link didn't like looking at his own cheap steel that much, but watching Orca swing his own sword in powerful arcs through the air, as he did now, made his heart swell with pride.

"The tempered sword," the Koholint told his apprentice as he swung, putting no particular emphasis put on either part of the sword's name. "It's a longsword, deadly sharp, the steel folded on itself so many times that it glows red in the right light and mood. It was passed down to me by my own swordsmaster, who had it passed down to him, and back many and more generations." He paused to look at Link importantly. "It was forged during the Disarmament by priests of the Wind Fish. It is a holy blade, so sharp that it was used to slit the hard ivory throat of Harkinian the Bloodthirsty, the king who conquered Koholint."

That was a speech Orca had recited dozens -- hundreds -- of times, but Link never tired of hearing it, just as he never tired of responding, "But one of Harkinian the Bloodthirsty's own Royal Bodyguards slit his throat, Master."

Orca straightened importantly. "With this sword," he maintained stubbornly. "What will you trust -- your swordsmaster's words, which he received from his own swordsmaster, or a revisionist Hylian history?"

Link grinned at him. It was not so amazing to him as it might have been to the Royal Bodyguards outside that they were able to make such light comments to each other when facing the threat of death. Koholint swordsmasters had been prepared for death since the beginning of time, after all. He even found his tense muscles relaxing and was glad; he knew that it would be easier to slaughter the Hylians when he was loose and calm.

He was also off-guard. With a terrible scream, the door of the swordsmasters' hut sailed off its hinges and four Royal Bodyguards swarmed in, dropping the tourney sword crate they'd used to ram the door. "Let me up front! I knew they'd be here!" snapped the authoritative one Link had heard earlier. While he watched, the oldest Bodyguard pushed his way to the front of the others, who were still young and wide-eyed.

__

The captain dies first, Link thought as the man stopped to look at them; he wasted no time in preparing to make that a reality. Without looking at Orca, he slid into his battle stance: lifting his sword and positioning the front of his body to face the adjacent wall, offering his enemies only the narrow blade of his side to attack.

The captain's eyes were trained on Orca, Link saw. "Do you know who I am?" he asked the old man. His hand was hovering near the hilt of his sword, safe in its scabbard. _And it best stay there, if he knows what's good for him._

Orca had adopted the standard battle stance too, his tempered sword glowing faintly red-yellow with the remnants of sunset. "I know you're a trespasser," the swordsmaster said without fear or worry. "I know you shouldn't be on _my_ land, or manhandling the crate that _my_ swords are in. I know you're about to die."

"I think the old fool's forgotten he's property of _Hyrule_, not some barbaric Koholint royalty." The captain chortled and looked around at his underlings, inviting them to share in on the joke. Their meaty laughter echoed through the wooden hut. "Well, it doesn't matter if you know who I am or not, old man. I know who you are. I've been trailing you for months, truth be told -- and if my eyes don't deceive me, you're brandishing a sword, and are breaking Hylian law."

"Why does Hylian law apply to an old man minding his business on Koholint?" Orca complained.

"The old man doesn't hear too well, does he?" the captain sighed. His hand moved away from the hilt of his sword and slid into his purple and gray surcoat.

Link thought of attacking the Bodyguard then -- he hadn't noticed him yet, apparently -- but the captain's underlings had taken out their shortswords and were fingering the sharp edges of their weapons threateningly. Link called himself a swordsmaster, but he was certain that if he took on three adversaries, he'd lose. The captain would keep Orca preoccupied, he knew, and Orca had slain all but one of the last Bodyguards who'd dared confront them.

The captain pulled a parchment from his surcoat, and unrolled it with a snap of his wrist for the noncitizens to read. Link could not decipher the cramped Hylian script on the parchment, for he could not read very well, but he recognized the Seal of the Golden Power stamped near the bottom of the paper well enough.

"An Order of Execution's been signed for you, old man. You've ignored the law of your rightful rulers for the last time. These are the orders of Governor Quillan Agah himself."

"Governor Quillan Agah..._The Deceiver!_" Orca spat. "A hypocrite! A traitor to his heritage!"

"Do _all_ Koholints speak in slogans?" the captain complained. "Well, I suppose sheep can only memorize a few choice phrases. I grow weary."

"As do I. I am prepared to die today, Captain."

"As you should be." The captain's tone had changed considerably; it had gone husky with something that Link couldn't name. _Can't name? Of course you can name it you fool, you just don't want to, you're no swordsmaster if you deny the truth, fool fool_ fool_._ "You _are_ about to die, after all."

"Not if I have anything to do with it!" Link didn't recognize the voice coming from his mouth; nor did it ever cross his mind that it would have been better to melt into the shadows, flee to Kanalet, and prevent the rebellion from becoming two swordsmasters the poorer. He became overwhelmed by emotion in a way that swordsmasters never were.

He had just admitted he half-loved his swordsmaster and was instantly sorry. Orca did not turn to acknowledge Link's comment, but his body stiffened; he'd heard him, and he didn't like it. The captain was more overt in expressing his displeasure. His eyes, hard and merciless as transparent green glass, flicked to him a moment. "Put down the wooden sword, little boy. No one wants to hurt you," he said.

Rational thought left Link for a moment. His master complained often about his nonexistent grooming habits and flippant comments, but it was the boy's temper he detested most. Maybe the captain would hate it, too. "I'm not a little boy!" he shouted in quick outrage.

"Shut up, boy!" Orca growled before the captain took too much interest in him. "I'll take care of this. I'll die before I let you put your filthy hands on the boy, and I mean to kill you if you try it. It's me you want, Captain, and it's me you shall have. Take me into custody, Captain, if you can. I must warn you that swordsmasters are superior creatures to you mere Royal Bodyguards, who are shackled to failure and death by your needless family ties."

"Spare me the speech!" The captain rolled his eyes and looked at Orca again once he was done. "And there'll be no being taken into custody for you, just your blood in the dust, and later, a hole in a ground. Back up your talk, old man."

Orca was nearly gone, now; the sparkle in his dark eyes that made him a kindly, wise old man with a potbelly had fled, as the sun now fled the sky. It was no different from other battles, Link reflected; Orca's personality hid in some safe place deep inside him while he killed. It was safer that way. But still he whispered, "_Gladly._ I'll give you time to regret entering my hut and paying any mind to the boy before I kill you."

__

He loves me, Link knew then, though Orca had never addressed him by name. Early in his training, Orca had played at loving him, seeing if he could separate emotions from business, as a swordsmaster should. He'd passed the test, but maybe, as they became fugitives all alone together, Orca had come to fail. _He loves me. He's protecting me, like I'm a child, a girl._

The shock made his cheap longsword tumble from his hands...and then the world exploded.

The captain had his longsword out of its scabbard and was swinging at Orca faster than Link could blink. While he watched the both of them, two of the underlings rushed him, as he had feared -- and then they had their strong unyielding arms curled around him, keeping him from moving. He blinked, surprised for a moment, sure that things had happened too fast for this to be anything but a dream. "_No!_" he screamed furiously, struggling.

The captain and Orca paid him no mind. They moved in a tight circle, making experimental swipes at each other, testing the other's defenses. Then Orca swung his sword up and around and towards the captain in a tight arc, an attack that sent the Bodyguard stumbling backward as he defended it. Hope swelled in Link's heart, so strong it made him forget he was a captive; although he was taking longer to slaughter this one than usual, Orca was gaining an advantage over the captain with an almost laziness.

It was that same laziness and arrogance that must have made Orca decide to show off. He spun and backflipped remarkably well for an old man, meeting the methodical blows the captain used to try to defeat him. He performed a backflip once more as the captain tried a thrust and Link squirmed in his tangled prison of arms, eager for some sort of resolution...

But as Orca landed his legs folded like paper money (if it was out of exhaustion, Link certainly couldn't tell), and his sword slid out of his grip. The captain looked down at the fallen swordsmaster, triumphant.

"_No!_" Link cried again, jerking. The two Royal Bodyguards holding him looked his way with faces blank and impassive. The third Bodyguard, perhaps the youngest of them all, watched eagerly as the captain considered, sheathed his own sword in its scabbard, and scooped up Orca's tempered sword. The blade glinted red with murderous intent.

"No!"

Orca was breathing heavily, Link noticed; sweat gleamed in fat droplets on the top of his shiny bald head. But he struggled to his feet, and stood up straight, and looked at the captain holding the tempered sword straight in the eye, his chin tilted upward. He barely looked fazed in the face of death. _He is truly a swordsman born, unlike me._ "I am prepa-"

He was never allowed to finish. "You aren't a martyr, you silly man," the captain sneered. He tilted the tempered sword he held in his hands -- the sword forged by priests of the Wind Fish, the sword that was red in the right light and mood, the sword that had been used to slit Harkinian the Bloodthirsty's hard ivory throat. He tilted the tempered sword and pushed it into noble Orca's belly, and dragged the blade upward, and pulled it free with a sickening wet sound.

Orca wasn't sweating any more. The red hole of his mouth was open, as if he was about to ask for mercy, and he hovered dreamily on his feet, as if he wasn't dead. _But he is dead. He's dead._

The captain smiled in satisfaction as Orca finally fell, bleeding and ripped and dead. The Koholint's tempered sword, in the captain's hand, glowed a sullen red with its former owner's blood. "So I guess 'swordsmasters' aren't superior to us mere Royal Bodyguards after all," he said.

__

I'm a monster, Link thought dully as the captain boasted and the other Bodyguards guffawed, staring at Orca's twisted corpse. _A monster... My swordsmaster's dead and I can't avenge him with my sword, nor cry._

__

No...I'm a swordsmaster_._ He remembered that suddenly. A swordsmaster lived without the ties that shackled mere men to failure and death...

The captain casually flipped Orca's blood off the tempered sword and laid it aside, advancing toward the captive Link. He contemplated him with his green eyes and leaned close, scrutinizing the pores of his face.

"What a pleasure it will be to present you to the consul..." the captain breathed at last, his sour breath feathering over Link's face. "He'll take you to see the High King and our regent, the Princess Zelda. I know it. Perhaps you'll regret turning your cloak when the princess sentences you to death by slow torture."

"P-Princess _Zel_--?" When he was fairly certain he was in imminent danger, Link was hardly the best speaker of the Hylian language.

"_Don't you dare speak her name!_" the youngest Bodyguard shrieked, breaking the intimacy the captain and Link shared; with sudden dreamlike horror, Link saw him reach for the shortsword in his scabbard, and he realized that it was very likely he, too, would die this evening. "Don't you _dare_. You don't deserve the privilege!"

"Put that away, Linden!" the captain said impatiently. "I don't want you sticking that sword in the turncloak. The consul pays good money for Koholints and traitors caught fresh from the field...and this is certainly a fresh boy. I'll show you how incapacitating them is done."

Link felt a flutter of hope for a moment -- but the captain was not offering him clemency. He realized that now, too late. The captain's upper lip curled and he seemed to consider a moment before he swung a mailed fist at Link's face. He thought it was funny how he heard his nose break from _inside_ his head, not outside, at how much it _hurt_.

He didn't realize he was laughing until the captain, upset by his sick bloody laughter, hit him again, this time above his right eyebrow. That was a blow that made his legs wobble, that made him attempt to slide his fingers over the cut on his forehead (slick with wet and drying blood) just to make sure he wasn't dying.

"_That's_ how you do it to leave them fresh," the captain said importantly as he stepped backward, his voice husky with bloodlust. He wiped his bloody fist on his surcoat and then turned away from the mess he'd made of Link's face. "Get that weakling traitor out of here. Quickly! We need to be off these mountains and onto the next ship to Hyrule by midnight."

Trembling with quiet rage, overwhelmed by it, Link couldn't stop his head from drooping, no more than he could stop the whimper growing in the back of his throat. _Like an animal from Animal Village._ Blood oozed from his broken nose and whatever cut the Captain's mailed fist had made above his right eyebrow, drip-dripping onto the dirt floor. Link closed his eyes so he wouldn't have to look at the his blood anymore, but the blackness behind his eyelids was worse. In the black, he could see himself dying

He tasted blood in his mouth and immediately hated tasting it. The blood was too coppery, too hot, too reminiscent of the taste of failure and death.

He spat blood on the floor as the two Royal Bodyguards pulled him forward, and the colors of the world swirled together.

"I suppose a drink of water is out of the question," Link said in ragged Hylian, hot bloody anger and flippancy overtaking his pain, but the Royal Bodyguards paid him no mind. Hylians were too superstitious to talk to the dead.

Koholint's governor always took his tea with sugar. The woman opposite him, clad in the embroidered green silks of a Koholint who had acquired some manner of wealth, disgustedly (and a little hypocritically) wondered how he could justify such luxury when those who hacked away at his precious sugarcane were not permitted to taste it themselves. She didn't say anything, of course -- not inside the Governor's Palace and especially not in this room. Furnished with exotic Hylian and Gerudo finery, the Governor's Tea Room was very attractive and inviting. Truth be told, she was probably more attracted to the man herself. She could not pretend to be fond of him; after all, she did not know him very well. But he seemed intelligent, articulate, clean, and even handsome (his dark hair was just starting to go gray). She supposed if she gave it much thought, she would like him.  
  
"Is the tea not to your liking, Clare?" the governor asked, stirring a teaspoon of the white granules into his drink. The governor was a methodical man, and spoke cleanly and crisply. "I recommend the sugar, it...gives the tea the taste it lacks on its own." His gray eyes, cool and purposefully distant, almost seemed to smile at her from under his dark eyebrows.  
  
Clare lowered her eyes quickly. She wrapped her chubby, tanned hands around her own

steaming cup of tea (too warm to drink right now, and the governor knew it), and shivered, even though the day was unseasonably warm for Koholint's island winter. "No, I...I don't need sugar, Quillan. The tea is lovely."  
  
"Ah! Clare..." Abruptly he set his teacup down on its saucer on the mahogany teatable between them. Noticing pale brown spots of tea on the front of his fine white tunic, he smiled apologetically...but his eyes were no longer smiling. Lowering his rich, rolling voice he asked, "Do you have the Kokiri..._product_ I asked you to procure for me two months ago, then?"  
  
Clare was the governor's supplier of contraband. His tastes varied from month to month but invariably included both Hylian liquor and Kokiri forestweed. When he discreetly sent a message to her several years ago requesting almond wine and tea leaves from the mainland and something else his powerful friends could not risk their reputations being caught with, she had counted it as too big an opportunity to pass up. The governor was more powerful than her usual clients, and knew things and people, that her other clients simply didn't.

__

They tell me you're the best, she remembered him saying during their first meeting. _Don't let me down!_ She hadn't, and she had spent the years cultivating their minor relationship. It was good for her, and _very_ good for her ulterior schemes and goals and plans; he paid well, which was important because her clandestine activities ate up wealth faster than it could be acquired, though she was hardly poor.

When she had started her little business at the age of fourteen, she had never dreamed of reaching such lofty heights! At thirty, she lived comfortably, dressed extravagantly, and spoke Koholint, Hylian, and Calatian fluently. She was not particularly proud of her success; it just meant that even though she hadn't had the start in life many of her Hylian counterparts had, she had made the right decision. It was more than most women could say.  
  
"That's why I came here," she lied after a long pause. "We...the forestweed...there's a problem."  
  
"Problem?" the governor repeated, his eagerness withering away like a waterlily in the midsummer sun. He took a delicate sip of his tea, winced, added more sugar. Looked down at his timepiece. The rich light of the setting sun, spilling into the Tea Room from a window paned with stained glass, glittered strongly on the glassy face of the watch as it ticked away time ceaselessly. He set it carelessly on the table between them. "What's the problem, Clare?"  
  
"The _forestweed_ is the problem, Quillan," Clare said shortly, hesitant to tell the story and cursing herself for ever revealing such an error to her wealthiest client. _I should just come out with it._ "There is none! There have been no ships allowed out of Southern Harbor for the last month except those on official business for the kingdom. You know that. There haven't been any ships allowed _in_, either. _Willow-Weed_" -- referring now to her own, personal ship, held in the name of a fictional Hylian husband -- "is still docked in the harbor at Lake Hylia. Surely you can persuade the High King--"  
  
The governor, who had been stirring his sweet tea restlessly, lowered his drowsy eyes. "Ah...please don't mention Harkinian in this room in that manner," he said delicately. "I hold no influence over him. He's merely my friend."  
  
"All right." She wondered, suddenly, why he bothered sparing the feelings of a thin-blooded Hylian. "I'm sorry, Quillan, but my problem still stands. I can't get my hands on any sort of contraband whatsoever."  
  
Quillan's thin lips grew even thinner, and he rose. For one outraged moment, Clare thought he might hit her, but he abruptly sat back down. "Then perhaps you'd like to tell me why I've been graced with your lovely presence this evening? I'm _supposed_ to be seeing Sasaery off."

He was being polite. On a whim, she had journeyed to the capital city, barged into his lovely home, and asked coolly to speak with him. Although she was uninvited and unwanted in these gleaming halls, a woman of her obvious wealth, noncitizen though she was, was not kept waiting long.  
  
Clare quickly changed the subject. She did not get where she was by disappointing her clients. "Sasaery? Where is she going?" What he did outside their business relationship was none of her concern, she knew. What she also knew was that this vein of conversation would doubtlessly take his mind off of her shameful failure. _And it's not every day that he mentions his wife to me._  
  
Quillan frowned at her. "My sweet wife's off to Southern Harbor to meet Koholint's newest Imperior Advisor...Lady Medilia Vermot. It's a very new position, created by the Princess Zelda. It means that hereforth Lady Vermot is Harkinian's eyes, ears, and hands in Koholint -- and that she will be residing in the Governor's Palace, so that I might report to her."  
  
Clare didn't bother to hide her surprise. "The Imperial Advisor? A _woman_?"  
  
"She's not exactly the right sex to be the Advisor. I'll admit that," Quillan said lightly, but Clare knew he was bitter. The governor, the supreme political power in Koholint, would now be reporting to a woman. A _woman!_ "She is, however, a Hylian, and Princess Zelda has been fond of her. Of course, she has her connections...and if you ask me, she has Harkinian's illness to thank for her lofty position. Our princess is regent, fond of putting women in positions of power and changing the natural order of things. Not unlike her useless mother, Isa." Hastily he added, "I'll deny everything if you ever decide to go public with that."  
  
Angered by his talk, Clare asked softly, "And how did you become governor, Quillan?"  
  
Quillan's cheeks flushed an angry scarlet. "What's the matter, Clare? Am I too light for you?" Here was a man with a chip on his shoulder.  
  
"Never mind," Clare said smoothly, tucking her round ears beneath her commode self-consciously. She had heard whispered talk about the new Imperial Advisor before this, of course, and though reports were vague they all mentioned she was very beautiful. Tan, dark-haired, and rather heavy, Clare knew Medilia's beauty to be matchless when she sadly compared herself to her. Conditioned by years of wheeling and dealing with Hylians on distant coasts, she was convinced that aping Hylian appearance was the only way to reach true beauty. She was annoyed, slightly, that Quillan had spoken of Medilia with anything less than reverence and she reacted badly. She lowered her eyes from the Governor's own ears, and it took all her willpower to do it.  
  
"I was a good consul," Quillan said thinly, looking down at his tea. His hand hovered for a moment over his teaspoon, then went back to his cup. "It was the only reason he..."

"Good evening," said someone behind Clare.

Clare whipped her head around. There, standing in the threshold of the Tea Room, was the Lady Sasaery. She was, in the eyes of many, the ideal Hylian lady, despite the fact that she had the appearance of someone who had failed to thrive: her white hair was straight and fine, her gray eyes dead and pale, her tall boyish body devoid even of breasts. Today she wore a black gown and matching traveling cloak, which did nothing to ameliorate her dreadful whiteness. Maybe the Hylians found that attractive, but even Clare found her appearance slightly unnerving.

Quillan stood. "My lady," he said in a small voice. He seemed to have grown smaller with the appearance of his wife; he had even thrown back his chest slightly, as if he were trying to distance himself from her. Clare sensed the tenseness between the married couple, and found it slightly amusing how one wore black and the other wore white. _They hate each other,_ she knew then.

Lady Sasaery had a high-pitched, thin voice that hurt Clare's ears. "I'm leaving now," she said.

"I wish you a safe journey, my lady." Quillan bowed stiffly.

"Is that _all_?"

Heat had crept into Sasaery's voice, but Clare was far from surprised; there was a harshness in the Hylian woman's pallid face that suggested she was inclined to give in to her temper. _Or maybe she just knows how to threaten her husband._

"Yes. My lady." Quillan wiped his upper lip.

"Very _well_. I suppose I'll be _back_ in a few _days_ then. _Sweet_ husband." Sasaery curtsied. As she rose, her queer pale eyes swept over Clare, and Clare felt herself stiffen. The moment passed quickly, though, and Quillan's wife left. _She's smarter than most Hylian women, I suppose -- she knows not to pay too much attention to some Koholint..._

Quillan sat down heavily as Sasaery swept out. He looked pale and drained. "I'm sorry about that," he said.

"It's all right." And it was; it was nice to see one of the dainty, thin, languishing Hylian ladies spoken about like faeries of legend doing something productive.

"You had something else to speak to me about?"  
  
Here was the part she loathed. Putting Sasaery out of her mind Clare sighed inwardly, looked Quillan straight in the eye, and said, "I think...I think it's time I told you more about myself than I originally intended."  
  
While he listened in wide-eyed silence, Clare told almost her whole tale -- how, on one trip to the coast to pick up smuggled gossamer, she had run into Mutoh the bandit; how she, a woman who was not much of a loyalist to begin with, became a full-blown patriot after talking for a half-hour with him; how, for the last month or so, she had devoted herself fully to the recalcitrant carpenter's cause. "I don't agree with everything he says," Clare said, wryly touching her gown -- part of a Hylian's standard dress -- before continuing, "but he has good ideas. Koholint should no longer be under Hyrule's rule." There was a long pause as she awaited his reaction. Everything, all her carefully made plans, the two years she had spent gaining his trust for this moment, depended on what he said to her.  
  
Quillan studied her a moment with a very un-Koholint expression on his face -- wary control -- that he must have learned from his Hylian fellows before finally saying, "I am flattered by your trust, Clare, and...intrigued by this revelation. I've been aware of Mutoh's underground anti-Hylian activities, of course. However..." He shrugged, too weak or too polite to say he wouldn't involve himself in the activities of a few Koholint malcontents. "You've been forthright, and I'll admit that I have watched this rebellion with interest." He paused, took a drink from his cup. "Clare, if you have come here to solicit my support--"  
  
"There will never be a better time to attack the kingdom," Clare said, heat rising in her voice. She felt as though she were drowning. "Don't you feel the slightest bit of patriotism?"  
  
"No. I--"  
  
"Mutoh believes the kingdom will crumble under the pressure of his continued attacks because Harkinian is old and ill, and even if the Hylians would accept a woman as his heir--"  
  
"The Princess is..." Quillan smiled palely and looked down at his tea, growing cold.  
  
"They say she's mad," Clare said, her voice growing soft as she studied him, "haunted by demonic, prophetic visions. She will not be an able ruler, Quillan! Surely you can see that. You must have known..."  
  
"I pledged allegiance to the High King and to whomever he saw fit to leave as his heir when I was appointed to my governorship," Quillan said, his voice growing hard as he looked at her -- his expression, she saw with dismay, had turned into one of incredulous disbelief. "The kingdom is nowhere near crumbling, and Mutoh's ragtag team of bandits will never gain their independence in this manner. Now, I ought to go catch my wife before she leaves vexed with me. You should go now." He got up, shining in his white finery. His unattractively rounded ears were revealed from beneath his hair as he stepped away from her and turned to look out the window. "Go, and I won't report you to the captain of the garrison. Come back when you have my product, and never mention such a thing to me ever again. Thank you, Clare." But to her, _thank you_ sounded a lot more like _get out._

****

A/N: Okay, so I have to know -- you don't think I'm creating Mary Sues and Gary Stus with Clare and Quillan and, to a lesser extent, Sasaery, do you? I'm kind of worried about that, even though I think I've given them some pretty huge, gaping flaws...

Please let me know how I'm doing and review! ;)


	3. The Audience Chamber

****

A/N: A quick thanks to anyone who reviewed, read, or enjoyed the two new (sort of) chapters. I don't plan any really major revisions, except for this chapter and the next (and I'd like to give it more of a plot), so I should be able to pump this out pretty quickly. It's summer, after all, AND I DON'T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT MY CHEMISTRY FINAL ANYMORE! Yeah!

Responses to reviews from the previous chapter are at the end of this chapter.

. . .

Chapter Two: _The Audience Chamber_

Zelda walked quickly through what was widely considered 'the greatest castle in all the world.' When Harkinian the Bloodthirsty built Hyrule Castle on the bones of his fallen enemies a thousand years ago, it was primarily a defensive structure. With the ascent of less belligerent kings to Hyrule's highest throne, the castle underwent renovations that made it more designed for aesthetic pleasure than comfort, and these renovations gave the castle its reputation. Its stone rooms and corridors, which froze in winter and sweltered in summer as a result, had large windows; its rooms were filled with tapestries and ornate furniture from distant lands, which took the mind off the thought of the castle's foundation of bones.

At the end of a hallway with a window that looked down on the soft blue darkness of the castle grounds was a small wooden door guarded by a single Royal Bodyguard. The princess felt her body tense slightly as she approached the elite guard. "Sir," she breathed, her voice cool but polite.

The Bodyguard smiled at her and bowed slightly. "Your Grace." This Bodyguard was Sir Arn Vermot. Arn was thirty-five, rather young for a Bodyguard, but talented with a sword. It must have been this talent that attracted his lady wife to him; despite his Hylian features, he had a pox-scarred face that was not much to look upon. "I assume you're here to meet with the consul?"

"You assumed correctly," Zelda said briskly, unable to find anything redeemable about the young Bodyguard that deserved her gentle acknowledgement of him. "Stand aside."

Sir Arn saluted his monarch and stepped to one side of the hallway, allowing the princess access to the room beyond.

Zelda stared at the small unassuming wooden door for a while, hesitating to enter, ignoring Arn's curious blue stare. _How I dread this._ Eventually, however, she hauled in a breath, pulled open the door, and entered Hyrule Castle's Audience Chamber.

The Audience Chamber was one of Hyrule Castle's more comfortable rooms, but not by much. Windowless and cheerless it was, lit only by torches from which oily smoke billowed. Warmth could only be gained by standing near vents that led down to the central heating furnace in the dungeons; many found it hard to suffer the sooty filth that puffed from them, however. As she entered, Zelda could even smell the reek of mildew that hung perpetually in the chamber. _The greatest castle in all the world,_ she thought bitterly.

Zelda stood in the threshold and dismissed her thoughts, her eyes moving about the smoky room swiftly. She was not pleased by what she saw.

Lady Medilia Vermot, Koholint's Imperial Advisor, was standing near one of the Audience Chamber's vents, hugging herself and seemingly unaware of the dirt collecting on the full skirt of her faded blue gown. Zelda found herself both staring in hatred at the Imperial Advisor and smiling with grim satisfaction as she noticed that the woman's sloe eyes were red from smoke. The princess hated hated _hated_ Medilia, who had been some nothing lady from some nothing house till poxy Sir Arn had become fit to ask for her hand. Now, despite the fact that her household enjoyed a standard of living barely above that of the common folk, she thought to act a proper lady: she spoke demurely, moved gracefully, and remembered her courtesies more often than the Princess of Hyrule herself. _She thinks to take my place..._

Her eyes strayed so she wouldn't have to look at simpering Medilia anymore, and she was instantly sorry. Just catching sight of the Castle Doctor -- veiled, robed, and turbaned Agahnim -- standing to the right side of the High King's throne was enough to make her grimace. Agahnim was a Calatian (a _Rito_, he liked to call himself) sent to Hyrule by the king of the Calatian Islands in the terrible period of famine and plague following the death of High Queen Isa twelve years ago. Upon his arrival, it was discovered he was merely a hedge wizard, and the grieving High King took his appearance as a slight...at least, until Agahnim singlehandedly healed Hyrule's wounded core. From there, his rise had been arrow-swift: by the time Zelda had become Dragmire's mistress, Agahnim was on the High King's small council, traveling to lands east of even the Calatian Islands, and earning himself a positive reputation.

All these things made Agahnim a noble man in the eyes of many. Still, Zelda grimaced when she saw him because theirs was a hard relationship to define. She did not rely on him as her father had come to, but of late, it had become hard to tell which one of them was Her Grace and which one was Doctor.

"_Zelda,_" High King Harkinian said, his voice riving through both the Audience Chamber's haze of smoke and the haze of his daughter's thoughts, "how good of you to join us."

Zelda frowned up at her father, stepped reluctantly into the Audience Chamber, and glanced at the man prostrated at her father's feet. It was the consul, as promised; even with his back to her she could see his frank handsome features, and could picture his childishly big brown eyes. He was still a young man, and comely. She had considered, briefly, taking him as her lover...then laughed at the folly of sleeping with a man beneath her station.

It also must have been one of her father's good days; he did not tremble as he rose to greet the regent, and his gray eyes were as clear as ever (and she loved, she thought fondly, the thick honey-blond hair now shot with white that had been her inheritance). The king was sixty-six, and usually well enough to give audience at court...but he was _still_ sixty-six. There were some days when he could barely support himself on his legs, certain days when he was senile to the point of idiocy -- but, strangest of all, was how his mysterious illness waxed and waned, and how on a day after a particularly bad spell, he might be completely normal. The insipid Castle Doctor feigned ignorance, but Zelda made no attempt at hiding her fury. On his good days, Harkinian found it endearing that his daughter (now with immense political power and many new responsibilities) was incensed that his illness refused to disappear. _If only he knew._

Her father was staring down at her in such a way that she rather thought he suspected something; it was a stare that bewildered her, especially considering Harkinian had been sick in bed just yesterday. In the face of such a stare, Zelda was contrite. "I delayed you, Papa. I'm dreadfully sorry for my womanish stupidity. Good evening, my lady. Your Honor. Doctor."

She did not want to acknowledge the two sycophants, not even the pretty consul, but found she had little choice; the Princess Regent always remembered her courtesies. Medilia beamed at her monarch and curtsied; the consul shifted slightly, as though in pleasure; and even Agahnim seemed to smile behind the veils which concealed all but his bright, beady eyes. Not knowing how long her father's silence would hold, the regent made her way slowly to her own throne. _Smaller, and to the left of his, as though he still gives commands. Even _he _knows that he rules in name only... Fear not, Papa. You won't be doing that for much longer._

"You interrupted what was a promising evening, Consul," Zelda forced herself to say in a rushed, purposeful voice as she sank gratefully onto her throne, too small and too far to the left. "I hope, for your sake, you have good reason."

"Her Grace is often busy with noble maidenly pursuits," Agahnim piped up helpfully.  
  
"Of course, Your Grace," the consul said humbly...but Zelda had the impression that his polite, cultured voice was secretly mocking her, just as the good doctor's comment had been designed to mock her. He didn't dare to rise; courtiers were executed for such audacity. "I am here as Governor Quillan Agah's representative. He has gathered...rather interesting information about our campaign, Your Highnesses."  
  
"Indeed?" the king queried with mild interest before his daughter could open her mouth. His eyes, weighted with cool intelligence, slid to his daughter in a sidelong glance. "I'll trust, since we can't read your mind, you'll humor us and share this..._information_ with us." He said it in such a flat tone that it was rather obvious he didn't give much credence to his governor's 'findings,' whatever they might be.  
  
"Of course, Your Grace," the consul said quickly, eagerly. "May I--"  
  
"You may rise," Zelda said lazily, as if he had said something distasteful. As he rose to his feet, she was struck, suddenly, by the naive, childish aura about him, and by a beauty that was almost Nayru-like in its intensity. She had to grip one of her throne's armrests tightly to stave off a mad desire to laugh.  
  
Once to his feet, the consul looked round at the two remaining members of the Royal Family and their meager court with bright, smoke-strained eyes.  
  
"We have," he began, "once again tightened restrictions on noncitizens in the province. Although this tactic has prove unsuccessful in the past, this new move has already shown a success rate of eighty percent. We have stopped raids on several of our supply posts using such methods. On a related note, the fresh influxes of troops Your Highnesses sent us were very effective in keeping our losses to a minimum in the Battle of the Animal Village, and helped us put a stop to the most serious noncitizen threat in that district; I and Governor Agah thank Your Highnesses for your genero--"  
  
"_You blundering fool!_" the king hissed presently, making Zelda, the two courtiers, and the consul (and even the stoic Royal Bodyguards situated strategically about the room) stare at him curiously. His face had turned an unlovely brick-red color, flushed with angry blood. "Battle of the Animal Village indeed! This is a campaign, need I remind you, Consul! We want to _discourage_ the noncitizens from rebelling and win the battles against them, not waste time giving these battles cute names! You have told us nothing new, and I _suggest_ you get on with it, Consul!"  
  
There was an awkward pause. Lady Medilia looked fairly shocked, and Agahnim was coughing politely behind his veils.  
  
"I beg pardon," the consul responded after a moment, in a surprisingly icy voice. "We have also managed to gain several..._informants_ willing to betray their fellows for a few of the kingdom's rupees. Those who might prove pleasing to Your Highnesses will be brought to Hyrule Castle to hold audience with you as they are shipped to the mainland. I have brought one from the province with me on my journey. I found her particularly, ah, _useful_. I would like to introduce Your Highnesses to her. Her name is Marin. She has no other."  
  
Almost as if summoned, the door of the Audience Chamber opened, and the girl Marin stumbled forth -- so it seemed to Zelda, she could not be much more _than_ a girl, barely past her first bleed. She stumbled for she was led along by two nondescript Royal Bodyguards, and heavily manacled and chained besides. She watched as the girl lifted her head for a moment, looking around in the dismal smoke. The princess could guess what she was thinking: had she dropped off the cliff of the world to the first of the three hells? Was she on the caldera of Death Mountain and about to be pushed into the mouth of Din, the most merciless of the Three?

As she got closer, Zelda could see more of this Marin, more than she wanted to: her rough but colorful homespun clothing, the darkest auburn hair she had ever seen, a tan that was almost gold, and...and her _ears_, Din shield her, her disgustingly rounded _ears_, the distinguishing feature of a Koholint, a genetic freak of nature, as much a part of a body as the pallid blondness of a Hylian--  
  
Zelda fought against the prejudices of the lower classes mightily. She watched, feigning the true disinterest of her father, until the girl was dumped unceremoniously in front of their thrones, next to the consul; he sidestepped away from her, looking very nervous indeed. She rose to a kneeling position, but kept her gaze and her face trained to the floor, so that the monarchs could see not much more than her darkly shining head. "Make one move," one of the Bodyguards warned her, "and I'll slit you open like a--"  
  
"Like a sacrificial goat, I know," the girl finished in a dull, quiet voice; it seemed to Zelda that the life had been sucked out of her, and she supposed that was what captivity did to some. Of course, when the captive was a member of a race barely evolved over the cattle it tended -- but her Hylian was perfect!  
  
The Bodyguard's face tightened, and he brandished his shortsword.  
  
"Greet the Royal Family. They're the last thing you'll look at before you die!"  
  
"Good evening, Your Highnesses," the barbarian said in the very same flat voice. "My name is Marin. I am _honored_ to meet the monarchs who sent my father, Tarin, to the mines."

"Ah..." There was amusement in Agahnim's voice.

"Oh, my!" Medilia gasped dramatically, a distant figure in the thickening smoke.

"Watch your temper!" the consul pleaded.  
  
Zelda leaned forward, _the_ expression plastered on her face: the pitying, concerned expression she wore whenever she sentenced, whenever she asked questions of a prisoner. It was an expression that melted a man's heart like ice in the sun, and turned his will to water. She doubted it would have anything close to this effect on a female, but she was fully willing to try. They would all be surprised, she thought with a smug smile behind her mask, at how many times she had worn this expression...and with how many men. "Enough of that," she snapped, businesslike. "We need you to give us information, Marin. Can you handle that?"  
  
"I'm hearing you."  
  
"Good." She leaned back in her throne, pleased with her performance, as usual, although Marin hadn't even been looking at her. "Where is the ringleader?"  
  
She waited, and waited, but there was naught but silence from the maid.  
  
The consul swatted the back of the islander's neck, but she made no sign of feeling it. "Her Grace speaks to you! Idiot!" he bellowed. "You should be honored at such privilege! Answer her question!"  
  
Marin lifted her head, and Zelda was alarmed to see that one of her eyes was black and almost swollen shut; the other, however, was not dull as Zelda expected. It was filled with anger, and bitterness...and sadness, she could see sadness there as well. "The princess is a conniving, wretched whore!" she hissed acidically.  
  
"Stop that!" the consul whined pathetically. "How dare you talk to the princess that way! You should be honored that the royalty took time out of their schedules to agree to hearing you!"  
  
Zelda whipped her head round to look at her father, seeking guidance...but her father was gone. In his place was a drooling, grinning idiot whose crown was lopsided on a head still thick with hair. Sighing inwardly, she realized perhaps this _wasn't_ a good day for him after all. "I think that's quite enough for His Grace today," she said. "Doctor, you ought to take your king back to his bedchamber now; he needs his rest. I shall be along presently."

Agahnim bowed. "As Her Grace wishes." Urging with his soft purplish hands and a soft insistent voice, the old wizard got Harkinian out of his throne and shuffled him out of the Audience Chamber. _That takes care of two problems._

Once certain that the pair of them wouldn't be returning, the weary regent fixed her attention back on Marin. "...And you!"  
  
"Perhaps we should ask an..._easier_ question, Your Grace."  
  
"Excellent idea, Consul," Zelda deadpanned. "This is your last chance, Marin. Don't make them have to kill you. Who does this man talk to? Not who he sleeps with, who he talks to."  
  
"I will not betray Mutoh!" Marin said in a weepy voice; Zelda saw with mingled horror and embarrassment that she had started to cry. "H...he's a good man! He doesn't deserve to die at the hands of the Hylians! I shall divulge nothing, you selfish, worldly woman! I only...I only wanted to see the capital of the great kingdom, but it's cold. _Awfully_ cold."  
  
_She has force of will, this one._ Zelda considered a moment...then politely turned her face away. "Kill her," she said. "Kill the useless maid. May the Wind Fish save her, if it can."  
  
The consul looked at the princess curiously. "What is a _Wind_ Fi--?"  
  
He never finished his question. At the princess' instruction, the Royal Bodyguard with the unsheathed shortsword swung the said sword forward and put a premature end to the young maid's life by slitting her throat.  
  
"Look what you've done!" Zelda heard the consul say, though she was strangely blind. "This tunic was new...oh, good goddesses, look at this mess! I'll have you know that this is coming out of your salary!"  
  
The princess turned round to look at him, and he seemed struck mute at the expression on her face. "It's their deity," she said. "You don't know that? You're the consul of the Koholint province, and you don't _know_ that?"

"Erm...never mind that. We've a problem to discuss, it would seem. This was the most promising Koholint I could find down in the island's gaols; I had hoped to make a good impression with her. I'd like to think that most of the other rebels we've taken captive wouldn't be so blindly loyal when brought before their rulers...but in my heart I know that most I bring before you will end up like _this_ sorry case."

__

I'd like to think you were a competent consul, Zelda thought as the consul stared darkly down at the mess that had been Marin.

"A problem I've taken into consideration, Consul," the regent said, shifting in her uncomfortable seat. "It's why I made Lady Vermot Koholint's Imperial Advisor. We mean to win hearts and minds -- _and_ information -- when we send her to the province...when, my lady? In the morning?"

Zelda was silent as Lady Medilia made some simpering affirmative response and bobbed a curtsy. _Why did I make her my Imperial Advisor?_ she wondered vaguely, barely aware that she had supplanted the king in her own shrewd mind. It certainly hadn't been to win hearts and minds and information, as she'd curtly told the consul; it had not even been to remove responsibilities from the very male Governor Quillan Agah, as her father suspected on his good days.

No...she'd made Medilia Koholint's Imperial Advisor so she could kill her. _You sail to your death tomorrow, my lady. I hope you are prepared._

"Your Grace? Are you well?"

Torn from her lonely thoughts by the consul's voice, Zelda's pale glance jumped down to the man -- suddenly desirable with the blood that gave his clothing color -- and contemplated his question. Oh, she was well, and calm, save for the promising pleasure of hearing of Medilia's death; that pleasure grew taut in her belly. All the same, a vague disquiet seemed to tear at her...but she dismissed it quickly.

"Oh, I'm quite well," she assured him, looking round at her paltry court. "_You_ don't look so well, though, Consul...and Lady Medilia surely needs rest before setting off on her arduous journey. You two are dismissed...and please, clean yourselves up."

. . .

The corridor was awash with a pale moonlight that made all objects illuminated by it seem cold and Hylian. Shunning the moonlight, Zelda hid around the corner, glancing occasionally around it at a handsome wooden door bearing the Seal of the Golden Power. She pulled at a loose thread in her white gown as she thought, _The door is not even fronted by Royal Bodyguards...he is far too trusting._

Thinking about the faults of the door helped take the princess's mind off the fact that she was skulking in the shadows and looking down a corridor warily like a common servant. It was a blow to her pride to have to hide as she was, but she'd arrived in this secluded wing of Hyrule Castle far too late to surprise her ally as she wanted. Despite her curt dismissal, she had not left the turbid Audience Chamber till moonrise. It had been Lady Medilia who delayed the princess, attacking her subtly with her worries about her upcoming trip which she explained in a querulous voice.

It irked Zelda -- then as she listened, and later in retrospect -- that the noblewoman refused to care or was too oblivious to care about others' important work. _At least I managed to assure her that my order to have her sail to her death wasn't ill done... A pity she has to be disposed of, though. Important as she is, she's a hair too clever to really be used as a pawn, and she's far too unaware to be made an ally. A pity she's useless._

She heard the squeal of hinges as the door opened. Zelda snapped to attention and looked down the corridor once more. Closing the handsome door was a crimson-cloaked figure who walked swiftly down the hallway in Zelda's opposite direction once its simple task was completed. _So now you decide to emerge._ Moving, she started to follow the figure as she wiped her expression clean. "I need to talk to you," she said.

The figure didn't seem to hear her, but its pace increased all the same; its crimson robes billowed out behind it as it half-ran. Annoyance pricked at the regent, and she picked up her skirts as she increased her own pace.

"I need to talk to you."

There was a glint of ice in Zelda's tone as she said the words, and the figure seemed to hear it this time. It stopped, its robes stilling around it, and as Zelda approached it turned around to face her.

Zelda eventually stopped too, her hands balled into fists at her sides. "Are you losing your hearing, old man?" she asked in a deadly quiet voice. "Or did you think to escape me...are you that much a fool?"

"Not so loud, Your Grace. Your father sleeps yet." Agahnim's eyes gleamed with amusement in the moonlight.

"What a funny little man you must think you are. Nevertheless, you're right. We shouldn't be talking here." Grinding her teeth and wondering why she put herself through this, Zelda took hold of a handful of the wizard's robes and dragged him close before leading him forward. The princess wasn't particularly strong, but Hylians were built tall, and the two of them were of a height; and it helped, Zelda admitted to herself, that Agahnim let himself be pulled unresistingly along.

"I noticed a rather, ah...interesting absence in the Audience Chamber, Your Grace," the doctor commented as they walked.

"Lord Dragmire?" Zelda asked with uncharacteristic politeness, her voice devoid of tone. "He wasn't in the Audience Chamber, you told it true...but what of it?"

"Oh, nothing. I thought Her Grace might know where he went off to, but I see I was mistaken."

She wasn't fooled by his innocent tone for a minute. _He means to mock me._ But she allowed it, just as she'd allowed him to persuade her to slide demurely into Dragmire's bed at fifteen when she'd finally visited him for guidance -- for guidance on how she might go about taking her fate into her own hands.

"You think I mean to waste time speaking with you about dull intimate matters? You think that's why I evaded Impa when she came to 'protect' me after I left the Audience Chamber? Well, you're--"

"I'm right," the hedge wizard said comfortably. "You are exceptionally beautiful today, Your Grace...and exceptionally irritable too, it would seem. It seems both these rare occurrences are linked to that bothersome man...who wiped some of your powder off your cheeks, by the way."

One of Zelda's hands flew up to examine her reddening cheeks while Agahnim laughed at her behind his veils. _He knows me too well; he knows what Ganondorf does to me too well...there are no ways to deceive Agah, no matter what Papa says about hedge wizards._

Agahnim knew why she continued to allow Dragmire to bed her, perhaps better than she did. This..._bedding_ was something she'd agreed reluctantly to participate in on her fifteenth birthday, despite the good she knew what she was doing for her kingdom; and what the ambassador had taught her ignorant body that night had been _disgusting._ This..._bedding_ had upset her so much that she stubbornly refused to ever engage in the activity with the Gerudo again when she met smug Agahnim the next day.

And yet she'd met him again, white and scared and secretly eager, just as the Calatian had wanted. She met him again, and the time after that, along with the time after _that_, because of the way he'd treated her during their first night together and all the nights since. Dragmire's treatment of her was something difficult to articulate in words. It was difficult to articulate in words how he seemed to be as engaged in whatever they did together as much as she was, even though he seemed merely to tolerate her presence. How he liked to use terms of respect to address her, yet debased her in ways cheeky Agahnim couldn't begin to understand. Zelda was a princess born, and all her life had been cosseted in ways a royal ought to be. It was a new, dizzying experience to be with apathetic Dragmire. And in a way, she even came to despise him for making her feel like that, the same way she came to despise him for making her perversely enjoy their brief amorous interludes, and closing her eyes to pretend it wasn't happening, and always coming back for more.

A more naive woman would have recognized what Zelda felt for Dragmire as a classic case of a woman in love with a man who treated her badly. Zelda knew she was silly at times -- silly in her devotion to her kingdom, or what she viewed as devotion -- but she wasn't silly enough to love a _Gerudo_...especially given that Gerudo, like Koholints, were freaks of nature. _I want him because he doesn't really seem to want _me_,_ she knew.

"What did you say, Your Grace?" Agahnim prompted.

Zelda realized with slight shock that she'd been speaking without paying any attention to what was coming out of her mouth. "I said that we have a problem with Ganondorf," she repeated. "He visited me before I was summoned to that makeshift court of Papa's and before he disappeared. He seemed to think it would please me to learn that he means to turn his cloak and offer his swords to the Koholints if we don't lift Hyrule's embargo on the Gerudo province. As if there's not a very good reason for that embargo remaining in place. He'd give up all the times I've let him have me for the 'good' of his useless people, the great barbaric fool."

"Relax," the wizard said, sounding rather exasperated. "Our Lord of Gerudo Valley won't be abandoning the alliance he made with you -- with _us_ -- quite yet. I'll make sure of it."

The regent's face fell. "You think you can do what I cannot? I kissed him, and allowed him to kiss me and thought that would sway him, though he's hard as folded steel. I don't think a kiss from _you_ will work wonders."

They stopped short of a patch of moonlight, but even in the uncertain light Zelda saw Agahnim shake his head. "You think a woman's weapons are the only way a man can be swayed? You don't believe everything I tell you, do you?"

"Don't be ridiculous." Zelda was unsettled. "When I talked to Lady Medilia earlier, do you think I used 'a woman's weapons' to bend her to my will?"

"You know, that's your problem, Zelda: you _talk_ too much. You're pretty needy as well, now that I'm listing your faults. You think just because Lord Dragmire isn't worshipping at your feet and kissing you tenderly that you've failed. Maybe you need that reassurance because you weren't given suck as a babe, but I can't say for sure. What I _can_ say is that your weaknesses will be exploited if you're not careful. They already _are_ being exploited, in case you think Lord Dragmire or your humble servant are oblivious lackwit beings."

Ignoring Agahnim's fatherly speech, Zelda whispered in anger, "You've said my name again. I have asked you not to use it. Must I have your tongue out?"

His eyes widened. "_Certainly_ not. I beg pardon, Your Grace. May I hazard a guess at what you're going to ask next?"

"I'd sooner ask my own questions, thank you." Zelda's usually soft voice developed a hard edge that cut through the subtle protests Agahnim made with his eyes. "You haven't medicated Papa tonight, have you? And you _do_ have the vial of milk of illusion in your robes as I requested, don't you?"

"Ah, that might be," Agahnim hedged. "However, Your Grace...there is a simple question I've been meaning to put to you for quite a while."

"Stop delaying, Agah." Zelda knew what question he meant to put to her and was hoping to delay hearing it for as long as possible. The same question he asked once a fortnight. She dreaded it. _You think you're not a part of my own twisted little game, you filthy bird? You know nothing of exploitation._

"It's not a delay, Your Grace, merely a question." He twisted in her grip, so that their cold eyes met. "There was...a promise you made to me on your fifteenth birthday. A promise to reveal a secret to me in exchange for my services. A secret that was the key to a...certain great power."

"I've not forgotten," the princess said coldly. _And if you think I ever mean to fulfill that promise, you're even more of a fool than I thought._ "As soon as I ascend to the High Throne, what I've hidden from you shall remain a secret no longer."

"Reassuring to know." With his free hand, the wizard reached into his deeply red robes and extracted a vial from it whose volatile contents were visible even in the weak light.

The Hylian girl stared down at the half-full vial of purple milk of illusion as it was handed to her before allowing her gaze to stray to Agahnim's face. His skin matched exactly the color of the milk, marking him as one of the few men in the world immune to the brew's effects. _I wish you weren't immune. Then I'd poison you with it._

"You have my thanks, Agah. I'm sure you have my father's as well, though he's not like to give you his thanks personally once he's quaffed it." The vial disappeared up one of the sleeves of Zelda's gown as slowly she smiled.

"It's rare to see a smile on the face of the beautiful regent," commented Agah. "How overjoyed I am that my humble gifts were the cause of such radiance. I must advise Her Grace, however, that the milk of illusion is a fickle thing. What you have up your sleeve is the strongest concentration of it you've received yet. I dare not increase the concentration any more, for fear of Harkinian's death...the last thing either of us wants, surely."

"Surely," said Zelda, not taking the bait. _Kinslayers are cursed to dwell forever in the deepest of the three hells along with rapists and traitors, you silly pagan._ "Papa surely must be suffering without his milk. I wouldn't make him wait for it any longer."

"How fearful I would be of keeping Her Grace from her royal father. For that grievous crime, I might be sentenced to death...like the sweet, if not terribly comely, Lady Medilia." Agahnim tittered.

Zelda knew her eyes were narrowing. "We've already discussed the Lady Medilia. I see no point in dwelling on how petty you think I am any longer."

"Yes, I'm sure we'll have plenty of time to dwell on _that_ once your clever little plan to dispose of her fails and you come to me, crying."

"Rest assured, Agah, that I've placed the details of her murder in _able_ hands." Zelda made as if to release him and turn and go...but suddenly a gelid wind seeped through Harkinian the Bloodthirsty's poorly constructed walls, and the princess found herself reluctant to release the sorcerer. _How can such a cold man be warm as sunrise?_

How odd that she was comparing Agahnim to sunrise...though, perhaps, that wasn't so odd. He hailed from the Calatian Islands, which were far to the northeast and far across the Little Sea -- even massive Dragon Roost Island, near as big as the whole of Hyrule. None of the Calatian Islands knew true summer...but, as far to the east as they were, they _did_ know sunrise, in all its blazing and bright glory. _And the sunrise stays with them._ She let go of Agahnim abruptly.

"You make me waste too much time," she complained as she turned around and started walking briskly away from the man who reminded her too much of sunrise. "I must needs go visit Papa now...but I'm sure I'll come crying to you soon, Doctor."

"There is one more small matter, Your Grace," Agahnim called after her.

"Oh?" Zelda stopped and turned around.

The skin around Agahnim's eyes crinkled as he smiled beneath his veils. "You simply _must_ introduce me to that...Governor Quillan. Agah."

. . .

I'd never get this awesome feedback if I was writing fluff!

****

Blue Taboo: I'm trying really hard to retain the darkness that the story originally had...I hope I'll do a decent job of it. And, much as it pains me to do it, I'm trying to cut down on the complexities/various storylines of the previous version. Anyway, thanks for reviewing!

****

ignorantly grinning: Mary Sues and Gary Stus are perfect human beings with super duper powers, unmatchable beauty, and changing eye colors. How dare you not know that! I'm kind of exaggerating their qualities there, but they ARE humans without flaws. I'm relieved that the rewrite's pleased you so far...I was really nervous about posting it, for some reason. :) BTW, I think the only way Ganondorf x Zelda really works is if one or the other is pretty OOC, but that doesn't stop me from loving it!

****

Midnight Starfire: Hey, a reasonable Zelinker! For me, Zelink is number two on the list of my favorite Zelda pairings, but I really like to see things that no one's done before (think anyone's written Komali x Tetra yet?). BTW, I have most of the other version saved on my computer if you really want to see it...but trust me, it's really not that different yet. I'm glad you're enjoying this, and update your own fic! NOW! ;)

Again...thanks to anyone who's read this far, and please let me know what you think of it with a review!


	4. A Proper Lady

Chapter Three: _A Proper Lady_

"My lady?"

At the question Medilia blinked and looked around, slowly becoming aware of her surroundings and the fact that she tasted salt on her lips. She lowered her gaze, embarrassed, once she recognized the placid turquoise waters and scrubbed wooden pier of Koholint Island's Southern Harbor. _You're not even on the wharf yet, you can't let your mind wander,_ she chided herself. "A daydream," she admitted to the anxious Royal Bodyguard standing before her on the gangplank. "I forgot myself."

The Bodyguard seemed to smile at her, but the shadows thrown both by his helmet and the night made it hard to say for sure. "Something that happens to all of us," he said. "My lady...this gangplank is sloppily constructed, I think, and extremely precarious. I fear for your safety if you stand here much longer. Come with me." He extended a gauntleted hand.

Shamed by her lapse, Medilia redoubled her efforts to act a proper lady. Bobbing a curtsy, she took the man's hand and walked down with him to stand on Southern Harbor.

Devoid of all buildings, empty of all boats, and stretching in all directions, swallowing both land and sea, Southern Harbor was a marvel of Hylian triumph over foreign barbaric nature. The quay extended an abnormal distance inland, its wooden slats hiding a long strip of Koholint beach. The waves of the Hylian Gulf lapped tantalizingly against the pier's poles submerged beneath the water, an idyllic sight this black-moon night when the stars glittered against the surface of the gulf water with white-hot intensity.

In legends it was said that Harkinian the Bloodthirsty himself had built Southern Harbor, intending for its massive size to be an eternal reminder of his might. As Medilia stepped onto the dock and glanced down at the idyllic water, she could easily believe what was whispered about Hyrule's greatest king: Southern Harbor _did_ look as if it had been constructed a thousand years ago.

Southern Harbor stank of garbage. Down in the water, past the fantastic reflection of the glittering stars, Medilia spied the swollen, moldy outline of a floating Hyoi pear, too putrid for even the most determined seagull to consider consuming. Spotted with mildew and encrusted with barnacles, the poles supporting the quay no longer seemed to welcome the embrace the water as they had when the Imperial Advisor looked at them from the starboard side of _Willow-Weed_, the private ship hired by the Crown to sail her to Koholint. Frankly, she thought her position was more precarious now, standing on the ancient wharf.

Nauseated and disappointed at her first whiff of Koholint by night, Medilia turned away from the sight of the lukewarm water, training her dark blue gaze on the Royal Bodyguard who'd accompanied her. He was the only Royal Bodyguard who'd attended her on this long trip from home, and he wasn't near as courageous or talented as her husband Arn, but it was one more Bodyguard than she'd had as a chaperone when walking through Hyrule Castle's sunlit, flag-lined halls. "Where is my next escort?" she asked, hoping her discontent didn't bleed into her voice.

The Royal Bodyguard perked. "You mean the Lady Sasaery, Governor Agah's wife? She ought to be along shortly. She's traveled by carriage to meet you, it is said, from the capital city of Mabe. She's a sweet lady, and fair besides. She'll take good care of you."

Medilia looked up at the dark Koholint sky as the Bodyguard listed Lady Sasaery's numerous virtues, only half-listening. She was starting to feel like a cow, with the way these Bodyguards and ladies were shuttling her around. _They treat me like a lady, not like the Imperial Advisor,_ she thought with rare insight, sliding her arm into the one the Bodyguard offered as he started to walk her about the abandoned pier.

It wasn't like her to be so thankless, she knew, her legs moving as her mind wandered; the beautiful and generous Princess Zelda would never have made an ungrateful woman her Imperial Advisor, nor would she have granted that woman the privilege of visiting Koholint for a few months to prove her worth. That was why Medilia had to make certain that the feelings that led to her disappointment with Southern Harbor were quickly crushed. If she allowed those feelings to fester, she'd rant before the endlessly patient Princess Regent, as she had two weeks ago -- shameful!

Why had she even voiced her misgivings, anyhow? She should not have had any. After all, Medilia had only been outside of Hyrule once. And she'd always longed to visit the faraway places she saw on maps: the antarctic nation of Calatia, whose tiny jagged islands curved in a graceful arc around gargantuan Dragon Roost; the Lands Beyond the Sunrise, vaguely mapped, where men went, never to return; even lumpy Koholint, which she had visited once before to broil while the rest of the world suffered the chill of midwinter.

But a vague disquiet had troubled her ever since she had agreed to the princess' suggestion that she head to Koholint to help the governor with his duties. It was a disquiet that grew every time she looked at the queer purple-skinned Agahnim, who always seemed to be looking at Princess Zelda. It was a disquiet that finally manifested itself in that embarrassing speech. And because it was a vague disquiet, Medilia knew it stemmed from some subconscious ungratefulness. _Maybe this island trip will help me destroy it._ _If the Three will it so...I hope They do._

The Royal Bodyguard beside her stopped and turned around; the lady realized after a moment that he was looking back at the well-maintained _Willow-Weed_. Medilia looked back too. On the gangplank, she noticed a warm yellow light winking in and out of existence, a round shape holding it up; the ship's captain, she realized. The ship's captain was a portly, accommodating man who smelled strongly of rosewater. She supposed he was all right, even though he was a noncitizen who had no business wandering out onto Southern Harbor when there were surely chores to oversee inside for the ship's Hylian owner. "What is he doing?" she asked.

"He must have some menial task to take care of outside. No need to worry yourself, my lady. You are quite safe with me."

The Bodyguard squeezed Medilia's hand without apologizing for the familiarity and turned around so that they were facing the tangle of forest that Southern Harbor melted into and looming Death Mountain, topped by its strange egglike lump. The Hylian woman's brow furrowed as she stared into the forest and the road that split it in two; unless her eyes were deceiving her, a light was winking in and out of existence in the foliage, too.

"Ah! It must be the Lady Sasaery," the Bodyguard mused aloud when Medilia pointed it out. "The captain was setting out a light to let her know we've dropped anchor here; that's all. Come, my lady...let us return to the ship."

Although the Imperial Advisor allowed the man to lead her back towards _Willow-Weed_, she did it reluctantly. She found Southern Harbor far more pleasing the farther she ventured from the polluted shoreline. During their walk, they had stopped in a spot where a gentle, sweet-smelling sea breeze whispered against them; that proved a paradise compared with the stench.

The ship captain was there to meet them when they returned to _Willow-Weed's_ side, a flickering lantern in one of his hands. "The governor's wife approaches," he said, smoothing his bushy mustache with his free hand. The captain spoke perfect Hylian but had such a soft, low voice that Medilia had to strain to hear it. "It would seem a welcome's in order."

"We are aware," the Bodyguard said, his voice frigid; the courtesy with which he treated Medilia disappeared when facing mere Koholints, she saw. "Don't you have matters to attend to on the ship?"

"No, sir," the captain said humbly, unfazed. "The ship's been scoured clean, inventories taken...of course, there was little to do with such neat guests aboard. The owner will be pleased."

Before the Bodyguard could grump again, Medilia curtsied. "Thank you for your courtesy, Captain," she said. The vicious murder she had witnessed two weeks ago in Hyrule Castle had helped develop a tiny tender spot in her heart for the round-eared Koholints...and she thought it would appear unthankful to adopt the aloof attitude of her guard, anyway.

The captain blinked, as if not used to receiving courtesies. Then again, he wouldn't be used to it -- he was a Koholint, after all. "My lady is most welcome," he said more loudly than before, his voice almost girlishly high.

The Bodyguard looked agitated even by this comment, and one of his hands hovered threateningly over the hilt of his sheathed sword, but the crunch of wheels on wood diverted his attention. All three of them turned to the source of the sound, the captain lifting his lantern to illuminate what was before the group. The carriage revealed by the light, stopping several yards from the gangplank, was a perfect example of Hylian opulence: the wood of its body gleamed with some high finish, the lantern swinging from the front side burned with a strong light, and the glass window set in the door winked at them. Driving this magnificent, gleaming carriage were two healthy gray horses and one weary-looking Koholint dressed in a neat green uniform, the reins held limply in his hands.

"The Lady Sasaery," the Bodyguard breathed. He broke from the group and advanced towards the carriage, probably intending to help this mysterious lady out of her carriage.

"A fickle man, this Bodyguard," the captain commented once the Hylian man slid out of earshot, watching him open the carriage's door pompously.

"Royal Bodyguards are sworn to mind their courtesies in the presence of all ladies, not just one." Medilia might have elaborated, but thought that was enough to keep him from thinking she might be ungrateful. Virtually alone with a strange fat Koholint, the lady found herself slipping into silence. She might have felt slightly tender towards those barbarians sentenced to die...but they were only partly humanized in her mind, and thus not yet fit to hold prolonged conversations with.

"But the same doesn't hold true for Koholints, who are the High King's subjects as well. Interesting." He lapsed into silence then -- which was just as well, since Medilia didn't know what to say to that anyway.

It was then that Lady Sasaery emerged from her carriage, which prevented any awkward silence from developing between the two. Medilia gasped as she looked at her. Clothed in all black and standing intimately close to the Royal Bodyguard, the wife of the governor looked white under the strong light of her carriage's lantern, white all over: her skin, her hair, even her eyes. She was cadaverous, or so it seemed, and even taller than the man murmuring polite questions to her. The Imperial Advisor averted her gaze; she knew a true Hylian lady when she saw one.

It would not do to have the wife of a governor come to her, she knew; she would have to go to her. "Thank you for your kindness," she said to _Willow-Weed's_ captain before picking up her skirts and heading toward the pair of Hylians. The carriage had not stopped far from the ship, she told herself; it would not be a long walk.

She was flushing by the time she stopped before Sasaery and the Bodyguard to curtsy. "Well met, my lady. I am Koholint's Imperial Advisor."

Like most impassive Hylian ladies, Sasaery didn't smile at her. Medilia wiped the smile from her own face, realizing how flawless the other lady's complexion was. "No need to introduce yourself," this lady said in a dull bored voice that lacked any sort of sincerity. "I've heard much of you -- both from couriers and my own sweet husband. I should be the one offering greetings. Welcome to Koholint, Lady Medilia."

"It is a very beautiful island, my lady." Despite the other woman's unfriendly tone, she hoped that wouldn't turn out to be a lie; she hoped the interior was more picturesque than dissatisfying Southern Harbor.

A small smile touched Sasaery's lips, though it didn't reach her pale eyes. "Oh, it is indeed a beautiful island...I hope to show you _much_ of it. No need to bother with such formal titles, Medilia. You will be staying in the Governor's Palace with my own family, and I believe we shall get to know each other _very_ well. Call me Sasaery."

"All right, my la...Sasaery. We're going to Mabe, the capital city?"

"Yes. We ought to get going. It's a long journey to there from Southern Harbor, and you must be tired." She looked around the deserted dock. "At least you were not accosted by any _strangers_. Bodyguard!"

The Bodyguard standing a comfortable distance from the two ladies snapped to attention.

"You're to serve as our honor guard," Sasaery matter-of-factly informed him. "Do your duty, sir."

A sense of relief filled Medilia as the Royal Bodyguard saluted and turned away; the man vacillated between disdain and courtesy too often for her taste. _That's ungrateful,_ she told herself as the Bodyguard shouted, "Captain, there's a horse in that ship waiting for me!"

After virtually dismissing the Bodyguard, Sasaery suggested they enter the carriage and leave for Mabe. "Oughtn't we wait for our...honor guard, my lady?" Medilia prodded gently.

Sasaery smiled reassuringly -- or attempted to, Medilia noticed as a thread of disquiet developed in her belly. The other woman's pinched face wasn't made for smiles, it seemed, and the smile she tried to offer turned out to be more a grimace. "Fear not, Medilia. We'll be traveling on a well-paved road, and the Bodyguard will catch up to our carriage easily. We can wait, though, if you're scared of Koholint's leafy green trees. I'll understand -- they're something Hyrule lacks, after all."

That must have been facetious, though the lady's monotonous voice never changed. Medilia found herself slightly prickled by it. "That won't be necessary, Sasaery," she said rather stiffly. "As you said, Mabe is many leagues from Southern Harbor...and I am grievously tired."

Her skirts swirling, Sasaery stepped aside and allowed Medilia entrance into the carriage. Climbing in, Medilia was surprised to see that by some trick the interior was lit with the dull orange light flickering in the lantern. She could clearly see the fine leather seats and carpeted floor. _Hopefully, the Governor's Palace is just as luxurious._

Sasaery crawled in, shutting the carriage door behind her, as Medilia sat and smoothed her skirts. She had worn her best gown to Koholint, a navy blue samite creation that brought out the color of her eyes. The governor's wife had seemed unfazed by its beauty, but Medilia hoped to impress the governor himself with it.

The pallid woman stared at Medilia with a cool interest as the carriage started to move, the Hylian Gulf and Southern Harbor falling behind them. "Well, Imperial Advisor..." She paused, as if coming to a sudden revelation. "Imperial Advisor. What an odd title, seeing how Hyrule is no empire. An odd title to be held by a tiny beautiful lady."

"Hyrule is large enough to be considered an empire," the Imperial Advisor said carefully. It would not do to respond to Sasaery's compliments on her 'beauty'; despite her white blond hair and dark blue eyes, her face was too plain for her to achieve true beauty. "It's not wise to question the decisions of the Princess Regent anyhow."

"You tell it true." Sasaery's expression never changed, Medilia saw, not even when she agreed with her. "You ought tell me about yourself, Medilia. We must needs pass the time as we travel to Mabe."

It would not be an unpleasant way to pass the time, the shorter woman acknowledged; it would take her mind off the bumpy, jostling ride. "I was born a Crisca," she began. "You might not have heard of my house...it's grown grievously small over the years."

Truth be told, House Crisca had _always_ been small...so small and poor that their nobility had been only a title; Medilia had even seen her father go to work in Hyrule Castle Town every day like a commoner. A much kinder fate than that which had been bestowed on some of the more infamous Hylian houses, she had to admit. House Banning, for one. Its founder, a Royal Bodyguard named Sir Bann the Turncloak, betrayed Harkinian the Bloodthirsty by slitting the half-mad old man's throat when he ordered his troops to invade Calatia. The Bannings, despite their pledges of fealty to future kings, were plagued all their days by that shame. Some advanced themselves, like High Queen Isa, who'd been born a Banning; like her father, Viktor Banning, who became Koholint's governor; like Sir Viscen Banning, Captain of the Royal Bodyguards. Few could be persuaded to marry the Bannings, and for all their fame and money, their house was even smaller than that of the Crisca now. Sir Viscen was the last of the Bannings, and the house would die with him.

Medilia knew being a Crisca wasn't a terrible fate. Especially considering she was now Koholint's Imperial Advisor. She, too, had advanced herself, and couldn't afford to behave thanklessly when she'd been raised from dirt.

She continued to tell Sasaery of her past, carefully hiding a few things she was reluctant to reveal to a noblewoman, the words coming easier the more she spoke. Dredging up these memories of the past, she found, was a soothing experience.

"My father loved the sea, and though he could scarce afford it, my family visited a small island near Koholint when I was but a maid...we stayed there for a year." They'd fished and swam, sewed and danced. A happy year. The memories made Medilia feel warm and relaxed. "My father sent me to court upon our return, hoping to make a proper lady out of me. I noticed a certain guard there, and once he achieved rank and paid my bride price I married him."

That guard had been Sir Arn, of course. He was not the most handsome of men, it was true, but he was articulate and kind and treated her with courtesy. She romanticized the tale, neglecting to mention that he was also the most respectable man who had asked for her hand, a fact that goaded her father to accept quickly on her behalf. Such was the fate of the fourth, dowry-less daughter of Lord Crisca...a daughter that was already impure.

Too lost in memories to give the tale the attention it needed, she finished lamely, "...And after a few more years at court the Princess Regent made me her Imperial Advisor. So here I am."

"Here you are indeed." Sasaery's almost harsh beauty seemed to envelope Medilia in the dim firelight. "My tale is much less exciting than yours, Medilia. I was born, I grew up, I married my lord husband, and some day I will die."

A cheerful outlook, Medilia thought dryly. Outloud she asked, "What house do you born to, Sasaery?"

"Agah," the woman said with a small, private little smile.

The governor's house was another obscure little one, Medilia knew, and it may have been that Sasaery and Governor Agah were cousins -- but she smiled, taking the chance. "Of course; you've taken your husband's house as your own...what a goose I am. You two must be devoted to one another."

"In our way."

There was a strange urgency in the woman's voice as she leaned forward and took one of Medilia's hands. "Ten miles in," she said, almost to herself. Then she said, "There is something I must warn you of, Medilia. Something I've neglected to mention until now. You see, Hyrule is having a little _problem_ with this province, and with only one honor guard following behind us, we may be in danger of..."

"...Those Koholint bandits. I know."

Sasaery studied her swiftly, her exquisitely pale eyes moving up and down the Imperial Advisor's frame. "Of course you know. But just how much do you know of them?"

There was something in Sasaery's tone that made unease creep through Medilia with feeling fingers. Her hand spasmed in the prestigious lady's suddenly viselike grip, but she didn't dare try to pull away from one above her station. "I know only what I've been told, my lady, what I've heard and what I've seen. A Koholint was brought before an evening court two weeks ago. She told us the ringleader's name, how brave he was and how committed he was to his cause. A pity he had to turn traitor."

"Did you ever suspect why he'd choose to turn traitor?" Sasaery whispered, her voice throaty as it surely only was in the darkness of her bedchamber. "Did this nameless Koholint tell you what he was promised in exchange for turning traitor, or who asked him to do so? Would you even believe it if I told you?" She laughed then, quietly, thickly, as if her throat were full of things that should never be in a throat.

Medilia sensed danger here; it swam in Sasaery's eyes, radiated off her suddenly warm white skin. She cried out and tried to pull out of the other woman's grip, and it wasn't enough. "How would a governor's wife be privy to such information? You're hurting me!"

Sasaery jerked her head to the side suddenly to look out the glass-paned window, and the movement was as sudden and clean as the woman's sharp break with sanity. "I'll tell you how!" she screamed out the window, as if the words were some kind of signal, the murderous firelight of the carriage's torch shining in her white, white eyes. "I know because you've been double-crossed, because I am serving my queen, because you ought to be preparing yourself for quite a ride!"

She saw the flare of another torch outside the window, and then her world flipped upside-down, her head cracking against the carriage's roof, a sharp pain ripping through her side as flames licked a blistering line down her right forearm, and suddenly none of it mattered anymore -- not the stinging pain, not the hurt of betrayal, not the manic look on Sasaery's carefully powdered face. She had time to spy one of the torches out the window, and now there was nothing else to see, nothing but darkness. There was not even time to be afraid.

Sasaery's bestial, victorious cries were her first indication that she wasn't dead. Breathing shallowly, Medilia opened sticky eyes, awaking to fantastic pain, a thousand hurts. The world's sights blurred in and out of focus, none of the things she saw making any sense. She was staring up at the dark sky, knowing that one of the sides of the carriage had been ripped away; she could see Sasaery, whose carefully powdered face was smeared with blood -- whose blood? -- that gleamed redly under the influence of a dozen torches; she could see grimy Koholint men, their weathered faces twisted in triumph, their mouths stretched open wide.

She could see the captain of the _Willow-Weed_'s _face_...

Every breath hurt, and as she squeezed breath out of her spasming body, she could feel tears trickling out of her eyes and down the sides of her face, settling in her hair.

The captain said something to those surrounded around her in a clipped, sharp language that she instantly recognized: Koholint! She struggled to translate the words. "She's not dead."

They crowded around the intact sides of the carriage, staring down at her as if she was an oddity, staring all -- alarmed Sasaery, the rebels (she knew them for what they were now), the driver of the carriage, the captain. The captain's mustache was hanging onto his face by one side, and in the light of the torches, Medilia suddenly knew that his face was baby-soft, and had never known a day of shaving.

"She'll be dead soon enough, _Clare_," Sasaery said in perfect Koholint, her eyes still gleaming with mania. "All we must do is slit her throat. Being pierced through the guts is a bad way to die."

The "captain" (Clare?) gave Sasaery one long look before training her gaze down at Medilia. Her fat face was soft with concern, and when she spoke, it was in accentless Hylian. "You ought to know that your Royal Bodyguard did not shirk his duty; I was simply better with my sword. I made sure he lay dead in the Hylian Gulf before I followed you on the horse meant for him. I gave the signal for the driver to force the carriage into a bed of pikes. We had thought one of them would pierce you through the heart, but it appears one got you through the stomach instead. For that I am dreadfully sorry. I did not mean for you to suffer before your death, for you have not harmed me or mine."

"Y..." _You plotted to kill me? For what purpose?_ She couldn't force the words out, a fact that added to her disbelief. The men -- they could not have numbered more than twenty -- had combined forces with a Hylian lady and a mere Koholint who masqueraded as a man? Her Royal Bodyguard was dead? How long had they plotted this? How had they managed to become such a well-maintained instrument of murder?

It occurred to her to wonder why she wasn't dead yet. She tried to look down the length of her prone body, though even this movement caused immense pain. A long pike rose nearly out of the middle of her abdomen, stained with blood and waste; enough blood had soaked the gown she'd been so vain of around the invasive weapon that the navy blue was now black.

I'm dead. But the voice that echoed in her head was not her own. She looked around at the faces looking at her, acceptance quelling the disbelief. _These are my murderers. These are those who helped kill me._

She never thought to implicate Princess Zelda -- white, beautiful Princess Zelda -- because she was so far away, and just a girl, just Princess Regent, sending her to sail to her death with no idea of what was about to happen.

Clare stared down at her for the time it took for pain to ripple across her body two times. Then she turned her suddenly cold gaze back to Sasaery. "We must needs get her off the pike. The leader will want to see her...and I'm anxious to slit her throat myself."

Sasaery made some motion. Two of the men climbed into the ruined carriage, standing at the top and bottom of Medilia's pain-ruined body. They grabbed her by leg and arm and lifted her, slowly, off the pike. And Medilia screamed, despite her vow to suffer in silence and to be the shining example of serenity, because the pain was beyond anything she had before imagined. Why didn't she die? _Why didn't she die?_

They threw her on the dirt road next to a dying fire like so much trash, her petite body trembling and oozing blood. She was going to die. Now, right now, and she'd welcome it willingly. _Please let Clare slit my throat,_ she begged the Three, _please let her have mercy on me. Please..._

A wind disturbed Koholint's tropical trees suddenly, a wind so gelid it could have come from Calatia itself. She heard the men muttering around her and then her mind opened to _him_ in a breath-stealing rush, _him_ probing through the recesses of her body, _him_ raising goosebumps on her flesh, _him_ using power so cold to fill her ruined core that she screamed, over and over, hoping he was killing her, so long as he'd stop. He was an unrelenting force, his will almost sexual in intensity, and as he departed from her he slid once more into her mind -- and filched a memory from her, a precious payment.

She was trembling as she had before -- but different now -- and she knew that she was full, and would not die from the pike wound. The men were busy stirring, shouting curses, unsheathing their swords, so when she scrubbed blood and wetness from her face, surely they could not tell.

Only Clare the captain saw her, brown eyes wide, skin pale and damp. She seemed to sense the change in her. "What are you?" she said.

There was no time for Medilia to answer, for her to reveal her ignorance. Sasaery was shouting, "Mutoh will slit her throat himself!" and the men began to run, to flee, to melt into the trees. She could only see Clare standing where she'd been before, transfixed.

Mutoh? She felt a thrill of fear. There was time for fear this time, for it seemed to take Clare a long time to close the distance that separated them, to yank her to her feet, leaving Medilia's world in a dizzying swirl. With the pike wound suddenly gone, her attention was turned to her other minor hurts: the large burn wound on her right forearm, a bleeding cut that felt like it was on her forehead, bruises all along the side of her body and her back. _He_ had not stayed long enough.

An authoritative figure was running toward them, rising like a dream from the distance.

Medilia knew she was about to faint. A moment before she could, Sasaery sidled up to her other side and held her up, the two conspirators standing like mismatched bookends as their mutual leader approached.

He stopped before them, panting, out of breath. "Sasaery, Clare. I'm relieved that the two of you managed to survive the attack...but what is this?"

She realized she was staring at Mutoh the carpenter. He was a portly man, and old, with a bushy mustache and baby-fine silver hair clinging to the area just above his ears. He was dressed oddly in both Hylian finery and Koholint homespun, a blue topcoat pulled quickly over a bloodsplattered green tunic and leggings. There was an odd expression on his face as he regarded her: nostalgia? Infatuation? Hatred? Or a mixture of the three?

It seemed to Medilia that she should remember him, but she did not. She merely stood, hanging between Sasaery and Clare, as the man ran up to her with surprising speed and cupped her plain triangular face.

"Medilia," Mutoh whispered.

* * *

Sorry for the delay in this chapter, guys, since I'm sure you've all been awaiting it with bated breath. My summer was much busier than I expected, and so was the beginning of my senior year. I'm sure you'll all find it in your heart to forgive me. :)**Greki:** You think this is deep? I guess that means I've done a good job on one part of my hobby! Thanks for the review! 

ignorantly grinning: You've been severely deprived, not hearing about Mary Sues and all, but don't worry. I'll make sure you're never deprived again. ;) Thanks for reviewing!

Kelsey: I'm so glad to see you gave this a shot...seeing how busy you must be as a precocious 14-year-old and all. I'm just supplanting must with 'must needs,' since in The Scarlet Letter and such they seem to mean the same thing. Thanks for pointing it out, though...and thanks even more for boosting my review count so I seem popular and likable!

LauraCeleste: Hey, sorry to shock you! :) I just hope that by rewriting it, I can create a better sense of things actually happening, if that makes any sense. And there'll be more Link and Zelda banter after I get done reposting all the boring stuff, I promise. Thanks for your review...and all that other stuff you mentioned!

Midnight Starfire: Because of your amazingly excellent review, I'm going to stroke your ego a little more than I did earlier today and say I wish MORE Zelinkers depicted the relationship as you did in your latest one-shot. Oh, by the way, keep writing.

pradaloz: I'm trying hard to use some restraint in writing the characters and the situations, so thanks for pointing all the stuff you liked out. Your review made me feel nice and fuzzy. I hope you'll stick with me while I keep rewriting!


	5. Contentious Link Medilia

Chapter Four: _Contentious Link Medilia_

It was the first snow of the season and Zelda had been up watching it for hours, too restless for sleep though her entire body screamed for repose. She watched it fall in lazy, sporadic bursts, watched it cover the dying grass of the castle grounds in feeble patches. Leaning against the stone railing of her balcony, the young monarch enjoyed the feeling of icy air seeping beneath her inadequate clothing and looked up as the sky faded gradually to a dingy gray that matched the inner turmoil of her thoughts.

Medilia, she thought, rubbing her arms, unable to take her eyes away from the sky. _Where are you, Medilia?_

Hauling in a breath, concentrating on the tingling of her skin as her fingertips grazed the flesh, she decided to look for the Imperial Advisor herself. She closed her eyes and flung her will forth, searching for Medilia in the other world in which she'd lived all her life, reaching out for the feel of Medilia's aura with grasping fingers that no one who thought to spy on her would be able to see.

All were blind in this strange dark world, and Zelda worked exclusively by feel. She was disappointed, once again, to find that she could no longer sense Medilia's aura, which had descended on her in a warm cloud the first time she began the hunt for the older woman's essence; all she felt now were the weak vapors left behind by those who could no longer access this hidden world. She began to pull her power back into herself, a sigh echoing loud in her mind.

She hovered over Agahnim's aura as she felt it, though his power -- so immense, so intense in the close confines of this world -- cut into her like razors. His aura, for once, was where he'd left it; for that, Zelda was glad. Of late, he'd been setting up psychic wards around the castle by sheer force of will, keeping her from searching for Medilia as she wanted. Settling her own aura over his made her indignation upon her discovery of his trickery burn bright within her once more -- and made her feel dizzy as well. He was so close, so vulnerable. How tempting it was to sample a piece of his power!

She reached out to him -- though dimensions were hard to judge in this world -- without really meaning to, but by the time she tried to pull back it was too late. His base of power awoke, sucking her down and rolling her under his will, giving her the taste of him she'd craved. Indescribable sensations ran up and down the length of both her prone body and her active mind, a power too intense to articulate in words, a power that left her gasping and wet by the time he spat her back out.

"It's been a long time," he said suddenly -- behind her, from somewhere far away.

Zelda realized she'd somehow crawled back into herself as she snapped open her eyes. Her skin was pale and perfect, unmarred from Agahnim's powerful flirtation, but she felt disconnected, altered, weak-kneed -- the way she always felt when she exerted her will. She remembered that she had not sensed Medilia in that distant world. _Maybe that means she's dead._ The thought excited her, so that when she turned to face Dragmire, her heart was beating against the walls of her throat and there was a trembling smile on her lips.

He was standing in the threshold of the double doors that closed off her bedchamber from the chill, gauzy curtains tangled around his black-clad legs. Black boiled leather hid his imposing upper body, and his kinky red hair was braided, hanging stiffly to his shoulders. The look in his eyes made her chest feel tight, made her realize that the nightgown she wore was nearly transparent.

Folding her arms over her small chest in a belated show of modesty, Zelda shoved away her desire to wallow in psychic afterglow and strode briskly toward Dragmire, the hem of her light nightgown rising and offering tempting glimpses of her ankles. She closed the doors behind her with a sharp yank, shutting the two of them in a room that wasn't much warmer than the balcony had been.

Dragmire stood with his hands politely clasped behind his back, awaiting a response from the princess. She looked at him unpleasantly, then walked over to her bed so she wouldn't have to stand next to him anymore. Her bedchamber was exactly as she'd left it, everything in its place. "Yes," she said. "Two weeks since you've been able to get away."

Dragmire stared in the distance at something Zelda couldn't see for a while before answering. Their conversations were never hurried. "No," he said finally. "I've been reading for the past two weeks. That's part of it, but not what I meant, Princess. It's been a long time since you've deigned to use the Throne Room to interrogate a common Koholint prisoner."

"We haven't used the Throne Room since Mother died. It makes Papa sad. But this is a special case." She strode over to the vanity to maintain the artificial distance between them, snatching up a comb and taking it to her soft blonde curls. The comb did little to free the melting snowflakes trapped in her hair. "The consul promised me this one would serve my pleasure."

"Serve your pleasure." His accent bled into his voice as he parroted the words and she forced her comb through a tangle, focusing on her pain and not the darkness in Dragmire's eyes. Dark, so dark, the darkness of the other world...why was his presence making things low in her belly tighten? Why was he affecting her like this? She usually had better control over her feelings.

It was then she knew that her brief, almost amorous encounter with Agahnim had left her unsatisfied. All she'd gotten was a taste. She wanted more, but Dragmire would have to do. It was early morning, he was here and close, he was her lover...she felt her body tremble, the sole autumn leaf left on the branch to brave the howling winds of winter, at what she was considering giving in to.

Her decision made, she advanced toward him again, where he stood by the doors. Her throat had gone dry with anticipation, but her words came out smooth. "What have you been reading, Ganondorf? What are you looking for?"

"You'll find out when I do," he said. He smiled wide, the expression feline and vaguely dangerous, sucking her in. Her breath came rapid and shallow as he continued, "It will be a long time before I get time alone with you to discuss it, I fear."

"You're right. We oughtn't waste the time we've been given."

She fell to her knees before him and looked up, her eyes -- more blue than gray in this light -- as wide and vulnerable as any prey's. Brushing her fingertips up the sides of his legs, she attempted to lift his tunic, but he stopped her with a hand. "No."

"Ganondorf?" Zelda was confused; seldom were the times that Dragmire refused her embrace -- the embrace of the Princess Regent! Especially confusing given he'd come to visit her in her bedchamber, early in the morning when he wouldn't be missed. Ignoring the protests of her knees, her hands slid up to grip his hips. "We have time. Impa won't be coming to dress me for an hour yet. Are you--"

"_No_, I said." She let out a startled, protesting cry as he grabbed her by one arm and pulled her to her feet. The action, which would have warranted beheading had any other man done it, earned Dragmire only the briefest of glares. Her gaze then flicked to the hand held in Dragmire's iron grip...and looking upon it made her inhale sharply.

Her hand was slick with blood, fresh blood, _his_ blood. Where had it come from? She looked down the length of his body and spotted a large gash on one hip, the material around it ripped and sticky with blood. No wonder he didn't want her touching him. Why hadn't she noticed it before?

Zelda looked up to meet his gaze. "Dangerous reading."

* * *

Breakfast was not an enjoyable affair -- Dragmire was absent from the Great Hall, sick in bed, and her father had to be spoon-fed by his doctor and was led back to his apartments as soon as he was done. Such sights harrowed Zelda. She loved her father -- in her way -- but watching modestly dressed Agahnim guide food to the High King's lips reminded her how close she was to attaining all she wanted, how far it was out of her reach. It was a torture to watch him cling to life when she needed him so badly to die.

She unrolled her prayer rug and prostrated herself before her golden idols after breakfast, sending up her voice to the goddesses. She was not plagued by guilt, and did not wish to atone for imaginary sins; she did not ask for interpretation of her increasingly grim dreams; nor did she plead for material possessions she knew would not be delivered by the gods. The Three were beyond the hearing of mere human pleas, interested only in the praises Zelda delivered in her low, pious voice. She hoped it would be enough to persuade the deities to keep her heart hardened.

Agahnim was waiting outside the prayer room for her when she opened the door, dressed in the bright green of Koholint limes. Her heart froze when she saw him, and she knew it showed on her face. "How courteous of you to wait outside the room for me," she managed, her voice cool, supercilious. And it was; usually he waited for her to finish her prayers _inside_ the room, beside her, showing his lack of respect for the fervor of her faith.

Neither of them moved. They stood and stared at each other and thought unfathomable thoughts, the thick smell of incense creeping out of the prayer room and curling around them. Zelda wondered if Agahnim knew about her invasion of his privacy earlier that morn and immediately cursed her naiveté. Of course he knew; he was a powerful sorcerer, after all. Still, a small part of her hoped it had gone unnoticed.

Agahnim blinked first. Then he extended one of his arms to her. "Come, Your Grace. Accompany me to the Throne Room."

Zelda linked her arm around his and was relieved to find she could not sense his power. They walked at a fast pace, the wizard and the princess, his lime green robes and her maidenly white gown billowing out behind them. They walked in silence, neither one of them the sort who engaged in idle chatter.

Finally, he said, "I sensed you this morn, Your Grace."

Her first impulse was to lie, only he would know, the same way he knew that she had been wallowing in his aura. "I suppose you did," she said hesitantly. "I was searching for Medilia...something you've kept me from doing the last few nights. And I stumbled upon you. It was quite by accident."

"I suppose you didn't find our Lady of House Vermot, or you wouldn't be praying. And you must have assumed it was because she was dead, as if I were not capable of hiding her from you. As for your quasi-invasion of me, I completely understand. You'll be pleased to know I let you go as soon as I became aware of your presence...it must have been terribly intense for you. No, don't deny it," he laughed. "I know you too well, Your Grace; you're too reactionary to admit anything gives you pleasure, the same as your ancestors. I think you'll be interested in knowing that the experience could have been much better than what it was..."

Creeping power slithered up the arm linked in Agahnim's and she jerked free of him, frightened. He laughed at her.

"That's enough, Doctor. I can escort Her Grace from here."

The voice was not her own. Zelda turned grateful eyes on her attendant, Impa, dressed as befitted a war-maiden, all in steel and boiled leather. The last Sheikah left in all the world, Impa did not share her zealous belief in the Three, or she might have been there to save her from the dubious company of Agahnim sooner. Quickly, she sidled up to Impa before the hedge wizard could speak, nodding curtly at him to say she would see him when they began interrogation of the swordsmaster.

Agahnim's eyes were bright with triumph. He bowed before the pair of women then swept past them in the general direction of the Throne Room. Zelda and Impa traveled too, but in a silence that was far from the tense one shared with Agahnim. Impa was a good woman -- and gullible too, believing Zelda when she told her that her moon's blood had come, explaining away the blood smeared on her bedchamber's floor.

The Throne Room was near the front of the castle, on the second floor. Zelda and Impa hesitated in front of it, staring up at the imposing wooden doors. On the doors were carved illustrations of the reigns of various kings, and beyond it...beyond it were the thrones of the king and his queen, the High Thrones that had been forbidden by Harkinian in his grief over the death of his wife. Behind the thrones was the Seal of the Golden Power. It called to her.

She would sit on the High King's throne as she sentenced a traitor to death.

It must be done, she reminded herself, letting out a deep breath as Impa opened the double doors and revealed the very plain Throne Room, the score of soldiers and attendants, the twin stone seats, the three sunshine-yellow triangles staring back at her. _It must be done in this room._ The consul had brought a traitor to see her, trained as a Koholint swordsmaster. She didn't mind killing petty Koholint thieves and Koholint whores in the Audience Chamber, but a Hylian turned against his country must be executed in the room in which Isa had died, to feed the gods' thirst for blood. Only in that way would he serve as a powerful example to the willing traitors Zelda knew were inside Hyrule Castle Town's walls.

Letting out a trembling breath, she took the first step towards the stone High Throne.

Twenty minutes later, she had been sitting on the throne for twenty minutes longer than was comfortable, and the novelty of sitting in the seat had worn off -- so said her flexible face and eyes. But there was a rigidity, a tenseness, in her slim young body that looked out-of-place. Her eyes slid from one of the windows and over to Impa.  
  
"The consul," she said, "was not at breakfast this morn."  
  
"No," Impa said.  
  
Zelda slapped her palm against one stone armrest and started to get up. "I've had enough of this. If the consul has turned tail because his boy was nothing but a baseless fancy that's fine, but I should not be subject to his whimsy. Let us go, Impa."  
  
They were both looking very desperate to leave, but they stopped at the sound of loud commotion outside the closed doors of the Throne Room; the large doors shuddered a moment later, and both women started. Zelda sat back down on her throne, an expression very close to comical surprise overtaking her face. This expression grew steadily more severe as the commotion increased in vehemence and volume, and it wasn't long before those present in the room could discern voices in the nearby din:  
  
"_--WOULD YOU STOP IT! I WILL NOT BE MADE A MOCKERY OF IN FRONT OF THE PRINCESS -- VISCEN! VISCEN, RESTRAIN HIM--_"  
  
"Oh my!" Zelda gasped, the surprised expression slipping from her powdered face. "I do believe it is the consul and his boy, Impa!"  
  
"Yes--" Impa started hesitantly, but did not have time for anything more. The Throne Room's doors shuddered even more violently before they burst open with a resounding bang that made their hinges squeal and made them come dangerously close to slamming into the surrounding walls. Zelda gave a start on her throne; one of the lesser servants in attendance, already made uneasy by the memories of the last time he'd been in this room, turned sheet-white and fainted. The men (and there was no mistaking any of them for boys, Zelda thought) revealed from behind the newly opened doors were a sight to behold! At the head of the group were two common soldiers clad in chain mail and black, and they had obviously opened the doors; both seemed skittish and nervous and retreated into the Throne Room as soon as they were able. Behind them, and between two Royal Bodyguards, was a man whom she _assumed_ was the boy, though he didn't look it. Like the whore of two weeks ago, he was heavily manacled and chained, and though with her the measure seemed pitiful and ridiculous, with him it seemed a necessary precaution. He was putting up a spectacular fight! He was thrashing madly despite the Bodyguards' arms round him, and there was a dagger between his teeth...but where had he gotten a _dagger_, for Din's sake? It didn't make any sense! Her dazed mind barely registered the consul to the right of them, red-faced and waving his arms. He was also yelling.  
  
This was quickly getting out of hand, and Zelda suspected that -- given a few more minutes -- the boy would escape. She got up abruptly from her throne. "_Get control of your prisoner!_" she hollered. "_Get control of your prisoner, Consul, or get him out of my court!_"  
  
The consul looked up at her, and she could see fear flashing in his eyes -- he was scared of a boy who could not have outweighed him by ten pounds! -- but he followed her directions at once. Withdrawing his sword, he swatted the thrashing boy over the head with the flat of it...and the prisoner's eyes rolled up in his head, and he went limp at once, the dagger clattering to the floor. The consul collected the weapon and sheathed his own soundlessly, nervously; the Bodyguards dragged the boy forth bonelessly, and without further resistance. It seemed to Zelda that everyone in the Throne Room breathed a collective sigh of relief.  
  
"Oh, Viscen!" Zelda said sympathetically once the Bodyguards, boy, and Consul had stopped before the Throne. Viscen was the Captain of Hyrule's elite military force, and perhaps a decade younger than King Harkinian; his yellow hair was now almost entirely gray. He watched Zelda with eyes she couldn't see beneath his helmet. "Was this boy really so feisty that your expertise was needed?"  
  
Viscen chuckled. "You've seen what he can do, Princess," he said. "But if you still have doubt about his potential, I'm sure the consul can fill you in."  
  
The consul flushed and lowered his head, but Zelda spied a still-bleeding cut near his hairline. "Did he do that, Consul?" she asked softly.  
  
The consul sullenly lifted his eyes. "The little bastard tried to _scalp_ me this morn," he said. "Isn't that right, Link?"  
  
Link? Zelda stared questioningly at the consul a moment more; then her gaze floated down curiously to the scoundrel. There had been no time to study him before -- he was a blur of green movement -- but she had ample opportunity to study him unashamed now. He had a Hylian's _ears_, thank goddess, and dark blond hair; his face was strangely sparse and aristocratic, with a long sharp nose and lovely high cheekbones. It was too bad that the handsome face was covered with cuts and bruises, Zelda thought, and she wished she could see the color of his eyes -- she _knew_ they wouldn't be the warm brown of the consul's. But his green tunic was too short, and he wasn't wearing leggings...and what she saw looked like a _nice_ length of thigh. He was tall, even slumped between two bulkier men, cris-crossed with lithe muscle. She saw immediately why he was a swordsmaster.  
  
"Wake him up," she commanded the consul.  
  
The consul did not look happy about following Zelda's instruction, but he complied without complaint. He stepped in front of him, obstructing her view, and -- so she assumed -- slapped him a few times. It worked, apparently, because he jerked away as the boy began to thrash again. Zelda, slightly annoyed by his persistence but not enough to comment, looked eagerly into his eyes...and was confused. She took them for black at first sight, but when he jerked into more certain light she saw that they were blue. She decided they were the darkest blue she had ever laid eyes on -- beautiful! He was a boy who would be plain and forgettable despite the aquiline face, if not for the extraordinary color of his eyes. He thrashed for moments more, and the consul looked as if he would belt him again...but he stilled, suddenly, as he looked at her -- _looked_ at her, she realized, as she had looked at him. She lowered her eyes and felt her cheeks warm.  
  
As the Bodyguards forced him to his knees, the boy excitedly began to say something thick-tongued and foreign. In the long string of unfamiliar words, Zelda heard her name. She turned to the consul. "What is he saying?"  
  
The consul looked a trifle embarrassed. "I...I don't know, Princess," he said hesitantly. "It's been six years since I've spoken Koholint, and...he's using a dialect. It's too drawling for my ears." He laughed, saw the identical expressions on Zelda's and Impa's faces, then stopped.  
  
"Time and again you make me embarrassed to call you by your title, Consul," Zelda fumed. "How can I ask him questions when he can't understand them?"  
  
"It's a blessing," Impa said blandly. "Princess, he likes you. He says, 'If this is my murderer, then I am happily in chains indeed.'"  
  
Zelda turned to Impa in surprise. "I didn't know you spoke Koholint," she said with no real anger. "The consul could have avoided trying to translate anything at all!"  
  
"There's very little you know of me, Princess," Impa said slowly, and Zelda realized it was true; what _did_ she know of her Sheikah attendant? She remembered fourteen years of life with her, and no more. And, certainly, Impa had not gotten her white hair and the fine lines around her eyes from those years with her. What _had_ Impa done during those long, lost years? Had she...had she _killed_ people? That thought brought back the sting of some awful memory half-remembered, and Zelda pushed it away before it made itself fully known.  
  
"You're right. I apologize," Zelda said smoothly.  
  
"Shall I?" Impa asked, searching the Princess's face critically.  
  
"I bow to your expertise."  
  
Satisfied, Zelda's attendant turned to the boy, and what came out of her mouth was not what the monarch expected. "Can you speak Hylian?" she asked bluntly.  
  
The boy looked surprised at her straightforwardness; he looked down at the floor, then flicked to the ceiling, then to either side. It was apparent that he was thinking of thrashing and trying escape...but his eyes strayed to the Princess, where stopped. "Yes," he said in a voice devoid of the thick accent he'd had when speaking the barbaric language.  
  
"Good, because -- as I'm sure you know -- not being well-versed in Hylian is a violation of the laws set down for noncitizens, and you do not need another charge. Princess, you may question him."  
  
The poor princess was feeling unwarranted nervousness now, and _the_ expression had taken over her face without her realizing it. "What is your name?" she asked slowly.  
  
"Link. Link Medilia."  
  
"Medilia." Zelda frowned. "That's quite impossible. The lady sent to Koholint--"

Zelda never finished her thought about Medilia because now that she had his name she knew she was going to kill him; all she need do was say the words. He did no good to her alive -- and then Agahnim entered the Throne Room, his power radiating off of him in palpable, pleasurable waves. She shifted on the stone throne...and a horrible thought crossed her mind like a leviathan below water, frighteningly massive and overwhelmingly alien. Her eyes grew wide and she sputtered suddenly, "Get out! All of you -- save you, traitor -- leave us! Get out!"  
  
Impa and the Bodyguards, the wizard and the consul, a myriad of other servants and soldiers goggled at her, but the boy -- could it be? -- seemed to smile at her a moment. "This is not a wise decision!" Viscen warned. "I want four men on him at all times. If you're left alone with him and he feels the need to escape the castle--"  
  
"I don't care," she overrode. "Wait outside, if you are so inclined -- but I must speak to Link privately!"

* * *

High Queen Isa had died by poison offered to her in a goblet of uncommonly bitter almond milk. Zelda still remembered her mother's screaming torments, the way her body had writhed, how very red the queen's regurgitated blood had seemed on the front of her bodice. Sometimes she still had nightmares about that day, where she hung, suspended in horror, as her mother died again and again, unable to close her eyes to pretend it wasn't happening.  
  
So Zelda was surprised when she found a goblet of almond milk sitting on the desk in the alcove behind the thrones, behind the Seal of the Golden Power. The boy was sitting, unmanacled and conspicuously quiet, in a stiff-backed chair before the desk. As she followed after him, and spied the milk, she considered finding the offending servant and exacting punishment. Instead she shoved her soft feelings away, flinging herself into the chair behind the desk aloofly and gesturing to the milk. She had the boy's full attention. "There...this is better, isn't it? Would you like that milk? I daresay you haven't had anything like it before."  
  
The boy stared at her.  
  
"It's almond milk. Do you understand what I'm asking you?"  
  
Before her impatience grew, he snatched the goblet up in his hands with a startling quickness, held it clumsily between his fingers, and began to drink from it greedily.  
  
"At least you're not _deaf_--" she began archly, then let out a cry of disgust as he spat the milk out all over the desk and himself. The effect was startling, and gross, but far from effective. He was only lucky there was nothing on the desk -- or her! She stared at him in disbelief.  
  
"What are you doing? _What are you doing?_" she gasped. She stood up, eyes widening in horror -- _amusement_ -- as his eyes bulged, as his lips puckered, as milk spilled out from between those lips. He looked as surprised as she felt, and quickly, she forced her masklike blank expression back onto her face.  
  
"It..." He frowned, pausing for words or effect, milk dribbling over his lips and down his chin, "It's..."  
  
"Sweet?" she prompted, and at the word, she felt the painful, ancient horror again, the primal terror, the realization that death could come in such innocuous forms. Then she rallied, staring at her captive through narrowed eyes.  
  
The boy smiled at her. "Yes...yes, it's sweet! It's wonderful!" To her surprise, he picked up the goblet again and drunk from it. He looked healthy; his cheeks were flushed rosily, his eyes were bright as stars...and he looked arrogant, as pompous as a queen on her throne, as smug as a cat. Zelda's already inflamed mind pulsed again, this time with rage. What right did a traitor have to look so pleased with himself here, in the center of their world, the seat of high kings?  
  
"Well, I'm glad you like it--"  
  
"You wanted to speak to me?" His loud stiff voice was like a whipcrack in the stuffy, quiet alcove. Zelda jumped then checked herself, embarrassed. "Out with it, then."  
  
"Do not presume to know the reasons for my generosity, turncloak." The derision in her tone helped to stop the furious rampage of her heart. "You should be thanking your heathen gods. I could have you back in chains faster than you can say 'Wind Fish.'"  
  
Then the boy did something one of his station would never dare to do: he looked her, a girl gently born, straight in the eye. "You're only a girl."  
  
"Only a girl!" Zelda shouted in outrage. "I am _Zelda_, Princess Regent and Protector of the Realm, heir to King Harkinian, blessed be, Sixth of His Name. _You_ are only a grimy rebel with a high opinion of himself."  
  
"That might be so, but you're only a girl in all the ways that matter. A girl-child with no breasts, and such a skinny thing besides. What _do_ you require of me, anyhow, Your Grace?" It was as if she hadn't spoken at all. The beginnings of a headache throbbed queasily against the walls of her head.  
  
"I'll let you know in due time, turncloak. Rest assured it has nothing to do with your--"  
  
"It doesn't? Then surely you mean to bed me while we are alone?" He looked eerily right in his chair, in the body of a man, though his eyes held the mocking innocence of a child. "My master was fond of saying that some maids cannot abide the emptiness of their beds, though I never imagined _you'd_ be one of them. We swordsmasters are wedded to our swords, but I'm sure my cheap steel would only benefit if I were to service a maid royal born. Give me some more of that milk and we'll see if I can give you what you seem to so badly need."  
  
Zelda stared at him, repulsed by his overtly sexual tone. _Why must you be such a sordid heathen, Link Medilia? I am in need of your wit._ "If you said that within hearing of the king, you'd be dead by now." _It might be that I'll kill you myself._  
  
"Not with me unmanacled, and thus a match for the king's strength." He smiled dreamily, rubbing his chafed wrists. "The old fool would soil himself at the thought of facing me with or without manacles -- of that I have no doubt."  
  
"My father is the king of Hyrule, and has no time to waste humiliating green boys...and it seems to me you were not speaking this boldly when you were part of the noncitizen horde."  
  
"It seems to me this king of Hyrule is hiding behind his daughter's skirt. Why didn't he come to see me this morn, Princess? Did he scrape an elbow at breakfast and cry?"  
  
Uncomfortably reminded of both Dragmire's injury and the spectacle of her father at breakfast, Zelda swiftly tried to change the subject. "I tire of this. There are things I must know."  
  
"You won't learn a thing from me."  
  
"Oh, but I will. Even a headstrong boy such as yourself wants to live, I think."  
  
"We swordsmasters are prepared to die everyday. That means I don't fear death, Your Highness." Even in discussing the prospect of his own death, he sounded amused.  
  
"You should. You've turned traitor, and have earned yourself a place in the deepest of the three hells, if the goddesses are just."  
  
"What goddesses, Princess Zelda? The lifeless statues of the Three you pray to? How well will they serve you when I take your head off?" He laughed. "If the Three are as noble as you claim, why is your world full of pain and injustice?"  
  
"Because..." Anger, like a darkness, descended over her, thickening her voice. Valiantly, she struggled to regain her normal soft tone. "...Because the gods grow thirsty."  
  
"The goddesses have been feeding on mortal bloodshed and misery for years, and still they hunger. Haven't you wondered if your tears and your blood are the right fluids to be offering them? Perhaps their thirst would be better slaked with my spit."  
  
Appalled by his blasphemy, Zelda lashed out at the young man in her thoughts. _Only you, Link Medilia, would hold onto your pride and arrogance in the face of the gods, and only you would wave your empty courage like a banner in the barren wasteland of atheism. You are devoid even of honor, sacrificing it to the earth when you lent your steel to Koholint's cause._ "You'll not speak sensibly? So be it. Drink all the almond milk you will before Viscen comes for you. You'll need your strength down there in the gaols."  
  
She was almost to the door when the barbarian called out, "Princess Zelda." When she turned round her eyes went immediately to his face, tight and anxious, a little boy's. "Things go rust in your gaols," he explained, "especially the courtesies of green headstrong boys. Stay with me, and receive your answers...for a price."  
  
Zelda shook her head at his shamelessness. "You'll not demand a price from me."  
  
"I'm a boy to whom not much has been given; my price is modest, I assure you. That consul of yours is queerly cold and unresponsive, not addressing me once even though I only wish to know the fate of my father and my master."  
  
"I don't see why you expect me to know or care about the fate of two turncloaks."  
  
"I didn't, Princess, not really," the boy said. "Besides, it's been years since last I saw my father, and my swordsmaster was killed before my very eyes. I just wanted to make sure that what they said about your feelings toward noncitzens was true."  
  
Zelda took her seat, trying to form words he'd want to hear, trying to articulate her sentiments in terms he'd understand. "It's impossible for me to feel gently for a people who would like nothing better than to slaughter innocent Hylians and create horrors everywhere."  
  
"They wouldn't want that if you bothered to treat them like human beings."  
  
"But they're animals, and what my governor and consul decide to do with animals doesn't concern me."  
  
"And you call yourself a _princess_?" He said the title with such obvious disgust that Zelda felt her cheeks burn with shame.  
  
"How dare you--"  
  
"Ask me your questions."  
  
"You _dare_ issue orders to your ruler?"  
  
"Yes. Now_ ask_ your questions before I grow vexed."  
  
Willed into quiet obedience by the intensity of Link's voice, Zelda stared at him. He couldn't have been much older than her, and now _he_ commanded _her_ full attention. She refused to give him the angry response he no doubt craved. That had obviously been his motive for such impudence.  
  
Not knowing how long their sparring might continue, Zelda wasted no time in asking the question. "Are you, indeed, a traitor to your kingdom?"  
  
"You've already decided on the answer. Why ask me?"

"I want to hear it from your own lips."

The boy shrugged. "I trained with my master on a mountaintop and my mother was a Hylian, so I suppose that's enough to brand me a traitor. There. Is _that_ what you wanted to hear?"  
  
"You freely admit to committing crimes that will ensure your death by slow torture?"  
  
"I would that you could get the nerve to do it!" Link rose from his seat. "You won't kill me. You _need_ me, I see it in your eyes."  
  
"Think so?" Zelda asked coldly. "As easily as we got you, we can get another."  
  
"Try and find a swordsmaster with half my skill" -- his smile cut -- "or half as comely as me. Your search will never end."  
  
"You go to far, Link Medilia, presume too much," Zelda said. "I have no further need of you; this discussion is at an end."  
  
"So you're going to throw me back in my gaol, then? Are you too squeamish to kill me after everything else you've done? Whose skirt are _you_ hiding behind?"  
  
When at last he was gone, Zelda leaned back in her chair and looked out the small window in this small room, watching the snow fall still. There was something about the way it fell past the window that made her remember the morning, and Agahnim, and pleasurable warmth spread through her limbs. What she'd experienced this morning had been a taste, just a _taste_ of what she could have felt if she'd allowed herself to stay within his power. That scared her badly, because if it felt much better than that, she might spend the rest of her life in that parallel dark world, seeking another taste. Her worries and ambitions would diminish in importance and she'd lose all sense of self, submitting herself to Agahnim's will in a much more intimate way than her father had.

She could not feel Medilia in her head anymore, and she knew she would be happier when she couldn't feel Agahnim, either. That was why she had spoken to Link Medilia alone -- not to condemn him as a traitor, but simply to get a feel for his own power. To determine whether another assassination would become necessary.

A chill went through her.

* * *

This chapter is as bad as it gets. I swear!

And thanks to **Greki** for the amazingly awesome support!


End file.
